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The Peace Diaries Radio Program was broadcast during the World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg, South Africa from August 26 through September 4, 2002. It was broadcast to Africa, Middle East and Europe. |
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SHOW 1: HEALTH OF HUMANS AND THE PLANET |
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SCRIPT, SHOW 1 00:01 - 01:25 SHOW OPEN, KIT ID, KIDS’ QUOTES, KAREN QUOTE & MUSIC 00:55 – 01:11 (Karen Kaun, KIT Executive Director) We are part of one big ecosystem. Everything that we do has an impact on somebody else... whether we see it or not. It's really important to keep in mind that your actions have an impact on someone, somewhere else in the world. We should never have a doubt that we can change the lives and in the lives of others. 01:26 – 02:02 (Narrated introduction, Tessa van Staden) Man is an integral part of the complex ecosystem we call our planet. Our long term well being and health, depends directly on how we live, how we raise and irrigate our crops, collect food and educate our children. If we wish improve the health of our world we need to start with our own attitudes and actions. In the words of Mahatma Gandhi, "We must be the change we wish to see." Arun Gandhi, Founder and Director of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Non-Violence, explains how his famous grandfather would have defined sustainable development… 02:02 – 02:23 (Arun Gandhi, Founder/Director MK Gandhi Institute for Non-Violence) Well, he defined it in the concept of stradisha, which is an integral part of his philosophy of non-violence. He recognizes the fact that some people have the capacity to know things, and some people don’t have the capacity 02:24 – 02:54 (Gandhi continued) Some people are lucky to have had some kind of education and some kind of talents. He (Gandhi) says those who have those talents should not feel that they own the talent & that they use it for their own personal gain, to achieve whatever their ambitions may be. But that talent should be used as trustee, and should be shared with as many people as possible. 02:54 – 03:22 (Gandhi continued) So, in present context, a rich country like the United States that has made so much progress, has the responsibility of sharing this with the rest of the world and trying to help the rest of the world improve their living standards. If we can do this individually then we can also do this nationally, with each country. 03:22 - 04:08 (Gandhi continued) And it’s a question of sharing not in a demeaning way, as we do today. You know, today we go about and we give people handouts. By giving things to people we are only oppressing them further. So, what we need to do is to learn about sharing, which is not oppressing the receiver but helping the receiver rebuild their self-respect and self-confidence so they gain something more than just a helping hand and they are able to sustain themselves. 04:08 – 04:15 (Narration, TvS) Gandhi warns that unchecked consumption means rapid depletion of the earth’s resources 04:16 – 04:24 (Arun Gandhi) Producing more, consuming more is not the way to save the world. It's only going to hasten the destruction. 04:24 – 04:42 (Narration, TvS) The fate of the world’s growing population depends largely on how humans deal with ever-increasing demands for water, food, energy and economic security. Per Andersen, an agricultural economist with the Food Policy Research Institute, says preserving plants is vital to human survival. 04:43 – 04:57 (Per Andersen, agricultural economist with Food Policy Research Inst) It is extremely important to maintain biodiversity, and that means we have to protect the species that we have, the variations within species. 04:58 – 05:15 (Narration, TvS) More than 1 Billion people live within 25 of the most threatened and species-rich areas of the world. Tamra Raven, an ecological phenomenologist with the International Council of Women and the Organization of Tropical Studies, explains why plants play an integral role in ecosystems… 05:16 – 05:34 (Tamra Raven, scientist and ecological phenomenologist, ICW & OTS) We have to use the rare plants as an indicator of sustainable development because of the biodepth studies. We know that when there is more complexity in vegetation that vegetation is better able to capture carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and buffer climate change locally. 05:35 – 05:48 (Narration, TvS) Plants are also the only organisms that make sugar out of sun and water. Glucose, in turn, is needed to produce cells with energy. Raven says humans need to do all they can to prevent any further loss of plant species... 05:49 – 06:18 (Raven continued) What we can do is manage local vegetation. We can get plant cover or vegetation cover of the native plant species back on the ground. We need to encourage bi-regional seed trading of the local plants. We need to protect vegetation. We ought to have zero tolerance for losing anymore plants. We predict that there could be as many as 34,000 species lost in the short run… 06:19 – 06:33 (Narration, TvS) But conserving the so-called ‘flora’ of a region does not necessarily mean convserving ‘all’ vegetation. According to John Dierhardt, of the South Africa’s Dept of Water Affairs and Forestry, alien plants are exactly that – alien… 06:34 – 07:28 (John Dierhardt, SA Dept Water Affairs & Forestry) Those are plants and trees that have been imported; seeds and small plants, seedlings, for some reason, either for firewood or for other purposes. Once it’s in this particular country it starts using up the water; it draws a lot more water from the soil and it has other negative (results)… it it’s uncontrolled, remember, not within controlled situations like in plantations. It grows tremendously fast and it then damages the growth of indigenous population of plants. Invading alien plants are the greatest threat to this diversity; they impact on the productive use of land, they dry up our rivers in summer, effectively killing them as ‘living’ entities and they cause erosion, flooding, mudslides, saltation of rivers and estuaries… 07:29 – 07:33 (Narr, TvS) Tamra Raven says conservation should be accompanied by a decrease in human consumption… 07:33 – 07:48 (Raven) Right now the people, the humans of our earth are using 40% of everything the planet makes... 70% of all water is being used by agriculture. That won't last, it can’t last. 07:49 – 07:54 (Narration, TvS) Poverty affects biodiversity as much as conservation, according to agricultural economist Per Andersen… 07:55 – 08:32 (Per Andersen, agricultural economist Food Policy Research Institute) Poverty is an enemy of the environment, much more so than we have been willing to accept. Those of us who live in industrialized countries tend to assume that if people become less poor, they will tax the environment more. Just because we are taxing the environment every time our income goes up, it does not mean poor people will be more of a liability on the environment if they get themselves out of poverty. 08:33 – 08:38 (Narr, TvS) That was Per Andersen, agricultural economist with the Food Policy Research Institute. 08:39 – 09:55 SHOW CLOSE, MUSIC, SPONSORSHIPS, PEACE DIARIES WEBSITE  |
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