| |
"We only have one earth, so we need to take care of her."
That's what Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, USA believed. He
was worried that an issue as important as our environment was not
addressed in politics or by the media, so he created the first Earth
Day, on April 22, 1970. An estimated 20 million people nationwide
in the USA participated in observations that day.
"Earth day celebrates the deep-seated and persistent desire of populations
around the globe for peace and harmony, which have been disrupted over the
years by misguided leaders but never by the people themselves," George
Gallup Jr noted. Nobel Laureate Harold Urey, stated, "We in the older
generation have begun to realize the immense changes on the Earth in our
lifetime. Due to trains and airlines, we can travel quickly to all parts of
the Earth. Due to atomic bombs people all over the earth are in danger. Due
to the success of information and medicine we face the possibility of an
overpopulated Earth. All of these things are of great concern to all of us.
It is time we began to think in terms of a unified Earth. ... In this way
the people of the Earth can dedicate themselves to understanding these
facts, and to intelligently act on them."
Here are some basic facts of life: In 1804, world population reached 1
billion only. In 1927, it was 2 billion (123 years later), in 1960, it was 3
billion (33 years), in 1974 it was 4 billion (14 years), in 1987 it was 5
billion (13 years) and in 1999 it was 6 billion (12 years). At the current
pace, humanity is adding about 78 million more people every year.
Since the beginning of humanity, an estimated 75 billion people have been
born and died, and 6 billion born and still alive. In 1950, average life
expectancy in the developing world was under 40 years. Today, it is 61,
although AIDS and other factors are projected to bring it down in some
countries, mostly in Africa. During the same period, life expectancy in the
developed countries rose from 66 to 75 years. More than 1 billion people on
Earth are between 15 and 24. Another 1.8 billion are under 15. More than 95
percent of them live in developing countries, with limited access to
education and to family planning and reproductive health information.
Then let us think about and talk about our wonderful planet what we have
done to help it and our plans for the coming year. Earth day uses one of
humanity's great discoveries, the discovery of anniversaries by which,
throughout time, human beings have kept their sorrows and their joys, their
victories, their revelations and their obligations alive.
Earth day reminds the people of the world of the need for continuing care,
which is vital to Earth's safety. ... Life on the planet and the ills that
plague it will are marked on Earth Day, with "green events" planned by
governments and activists around the globe. But as the 32nd Earth Day on
April 22 was observed ahead of a huge UN summit on poverty, development and
the environment to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa later this year,
there is no "green consensus" on the state of the planet's health.
Scientists, writers, think-tanks and pressure groups are deeply divided over
the fate of the world's ecosystems. The forecasts range from the apocalyptic
to the relentlessly upbeat. Some scenarios are nightmarish: states go to war
over scarce supplies of fresh water, deserts expand as fertile soil is
depleted, and tropical island paradises vanish beneath the waves as polar
ice-caps melt because of global warming.
The European Union has bound itself legally to the Kyoto treaty on cutting
the pollution blamed for global warming, which the United States has
rejected on cost grounds - opening up one of the biggest diplomatic rifts in
the industrialised world. The Kyoto protocol will fall far short of its
goals to cut greenhouse gases because of the pullout by the United States
and possible foot dragging by Canada, but it is still a pact worth fighting
for, a senior European Union official said. "It is less effective. Of course
it makes it a weaker protocol if the biggest emitter stays outside," Margot
Wallstrom, the EU's environment commissioner, told Reuters after the first
day of the Group of Eight environment ministers meeting held in the heart of
the Canadian Rockies recently.
The Bush administration's top environmental official admits Washington has
done a bad job of selling its policies and says the abrupt way it pulled out
of the Kyoto climate change protocol has helped obscure US' achievements.
In answer to the question "What exactly are we supposed to do on Earth Day,"
the following has been helpful to many: Looking ahead we will strive in our
daily life to help "peace, justice and the care of Earth." We will seek to
make choices in our daily conduct that will foster harmony, lessen
pollution, diminish waste and assist nature (walk more, ride less, buy less,
grow some of our own food, recycle, plant a tree, etc.). Join some group
that is helping to further these goals.
[Mir Lutful Kabir is general secretary of Bangladesh Science Writers'
and
Journalists' Forum.]
|
