|
Life-Net Raw
January 3, 2003 |
SAUDI AID TO DEVELOPING NATIONS TOTALS SR281 BILLION
By M. Ghazanfar Ali Khan, Arab News staffRIYADH, Saudi Arabia (01/03/2003)--Saudi Arabia has assisted developing countries to the tune of over SR281 billion since the mid-1970s. The aid represents nearly four percent of the country’s average GNP.
The Kingdom has extended support to 73 countries, including 41 African and 23 Asian nations to execute a number of development projects.
This amount also includes SR26.2 billion contributed by the Saudi Fund for Development (SFD), which alone has financed 370 development projects in 65 developing countries, according to a study conducted by Minister of Finance and National Economy Dr. Ibrahim Al-Assaf and published by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Fund for Development.
Referring to Saudi assistance to Arab, regional and international organizations, Dr. Al-Assaf said the total exceeded SR78 billion. These organizations include the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, OPEC Fund for International Development, Islamic Development Bank (IDB), Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development, Arab Monetary Fund, Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa and African Development Fund.
The figures do not include humanitarian assistance provided by the Kingdom.
On a bilateral basis, Saudi Arabia has also become a pioneer in debt relief when it wrote off SR22.5 billion of poor countries’ debt, said the minister, adding that the developed countries have been slipping even further back from the target of 0.7 percent of GNP as Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) to developing countries. Hence, the international community should double its efforts to achieve this target, he added.
The study stressed the need to work with the existing institutions for promoting world development rather than to suggest new proposals for institutional realignment.
See also the original article at Arab News.
HUNDREDS OF SPECIES PRESSURED BY GLOBAL WARMING
From Environmental News ServiceSTANFORD, California (01/02/2003)--Hundreds of plant and animal species around the world are feeling the impacts of global warming, although the most dramatic effects may not be felt for decades, according to new research from a Stanford University team. They predict that a rapid temperature rise, together with other environmental pressures, "could easily disrupt the connectedness among species" and lead to numerous extinctions.
"Birds are laying eggs earlier than usual, plants are flowering earlier and mammals are breaking hibernation sooner," said Terry Root, a senior fellow with Stanford University's Institute for International Studies (IIS) and lead author of the article published in today's issue of the journal "Nature."
Root and her colleagues analyzed 143 scientific studies involving a total of 1,473 species of animals and plants for the article, "Fingerprints of global warming on wild animals and plants."
After analyzing all 143 studies, the Stanford team concluded that global warming is having a statistically significant impact on animal and plant populations around the world.
"Clearly, if such ecological changes are now being detected when the globe has warmed by an estimated average of only one degree Fahrenheit (0.6 C) over the past 100 years, then many more far reaching effects on species and ecosystems will probably occur by 2100, when temperatures could increase as much as 11 F (6 C)," Root said.
As temperatures have increased, some species began breeding and migrating earlier. Other studies confirmed that species, from butterflies and marine invertebrates, have shifted their ranges northward as temperatures rose, occupying areas previously too cold for survival.
"Our study shows that recent temperature change has apparently already had a marked influence on many species," the Stanford team wrote.
In their analysis, Root and her co-workers showed that nearly 1,200 species, some 81 percent of the total number analyzed, have undergone biological changes that were "consistent with our understanding of how temperature change influences various traits of a variety of species and populations from around the globe."
The North American tree swallow is among the bird species beginning springtime activities earlier than historically recorded. Field biologists, who kept track of some 21,000 tree swallow nests in the United States and Canada over the last 40 years, concluded that the average egg laying date for female swallows has advanced by nine days - a phenomenon that mirrors other North American studies confirming higher temperatures and the earlier arrival of spring.
Long term observations of flowering plants in Wisconsin show that wild geraniums, columbine and other species are blooming earlier than before.
Studies in Colorado found that marmots are ending their hibernations about three weeks sooner than they were in the late 1970s.
Measurements taken in Alaska revealed that growth in white spruce trees has been stunted in recent years - another expected consequence of a rapidly warming climate, Root said.
"Climate change models predict that the poles will warm more quickly than the equator, so it's not surprising that we're getting the strongest signals of biological change from Alaska and other northern regions," Root said.
A primary concern for wild species and their ecosystems is the rapid rate of change predicted during the next century.
"The problem will be the differential response of species," Root explained. "I call it the tearing apart of communities. For example, four types of warblers feed on spruce budworm caterpillars. But the birds are shifting north. What happens when the birds no longer are present in the southern portion of their ranges, and the caterpillar population is no longer kept in check?"
She predicted that rapid climate change, coupled with the loss of habitat and other ecological stressors, could lead to the disappearance of species - a consequence that might be avoided by taking proactive instead of reactive conservation measures.
"For example, there's a very high probability that global warming could contribute to a 50 percent decline in breeding waterfowl populations," Root predicted.
"One thing we might do now is to consider adjusting the bag limits for hunters so we don't add insult to injury in the coming years," Root suggests. "Because anticipation of changes improves our capacity to manage, it behooves us to increase our understanding about the responses of plants and animals to a changing climate."
Co-authors of the study are Jeff Price of the American Bird Conservancy in Colorado, Kimberly Hall of Michigan State University, Stanford biology professor Stephen Schneider, Cynthia Rosenzweig of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and Alan Pounds of the Golden Toad Laboratory for Conservation in Coast Rica.
The study was financially supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Winslow Foundation and the University of Michigan.
Source: Environmental News Service.
LORD GOD TO BREAK U.S. ARROGANCE
By Alice Smith, US Prayer Center(01/02/03)--"Even as we (the United States) have broken the backs of our oppressors, God is breaking the back of our arrogance and pride. (A stick was snapped in half.) Fear will fill our land until we humbly return to God. We have disgraced the covenants of our founding fathers and our land is defiled."
The Lord is shaking our foundations. America’s man-made gods are NO god’s at all. God is saying in the days to come we will see all our self-made god’s fail--with self being the biggest of all!
The issue in our nation is not the war with Iraq. The Lord says the issue is the war going on in our heart. The Lord gave me a Scripture for us.
Jeremiah 5:-7-19 says,
"Why should I forgive you? Your children abandoned me. They took godless oaths. They committed adultery, even though I satisfied their needs. They traveled in crowds to the houses of prostitutes. They are like well-fed stallions that are wild with desire. They neigh for their neighbors' wives. I will punish them for these things," declares the LORD. "I will punish this nation.
"Go among Jerusalem's rows of grapevines and destroy them, but don't destroy all of them. Cut off the branches because they don't belong to the LORD.
The nations of Israel and Judah are unfaithful to me," declares the LORD.
They lie about the LORD and say, "He doesn't exist! Nothing bad will happen to us. We won't experience war or famine. The prophets are nothing but windbags. The LORD hasn't spoken through them, so let what they say happen to them."
This is what the LORD God of Armies says: Because you've talked like this, I'm going to put my words in your mouth like a fire. These people will be like wood. My words will burn them up.
I'm going to bring a nation from far away to attack you, declares the LORD. It is a nation that has lasted a long time. It is an ancient nation. You don't know the language of this nation. You can't understand what its people say. Their arrow quivers are like open graves. They are all mighty warriors. They will devour your harvest and your food. They will devour your sons and your daughters. They will devour your flocks and your cattle. They will devour your grapevines and your fig trees. With their swords they will destroy the fortified cities you trust.
Yet, even in those days, declares the LORD, I won't destroy all of you.
They will ask, "Why has the LORD our God done all this to us?" Answer them, "You have abandoned me and served foreign gods in your land. So you will serve foreigners in a land that isn't yours." (Jer. 5:7-19)
The invasion of war will happen and possibly North Korea, China or several of the Russian republics will resist us. (Like Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Soviet Georgia area)
Return to Jesus Christ! Renew the covenant of our forefathers who sought the Lord with all their heart, turned from their sin, shed their blood for freedom and walked in humility and love with one another and God. 2003 is the year of decision for our nation.
The heathen cannot intimidate the man or woman who is intimate with God. Draw close to Jesus and He will be your strength and comfort.
Stop trying to be politically correct. All of us need to stop it! ‘And, Mr. President, tell who you are! Please stop trying to be politically correct!’
We are in a battle of worship. Satan wants us to worship at his altar of self, money, reputation, glory and careers--and the Lord wants us to worship him in purity, truth, holiness, love and forbearance! THE BATTLE IS WHOM WILL WE WORSHIP!
In 2003 there will be a shifting of leadership in the Catholic Church. The old is dying and the new is coming.
See also the original article at US Prayer Center. You can reach USPC by telephone at 1-800-569-4825.
IF YOU BELIEVE THAT PEOPLE ARE BASICALLY GOOD
By Dennis Prager, TownHall.com(12/31/2002)--No issue has a greater influence on determining your social and political views than whether you view human nature as basically good or not.
In 20 years as a radio talk show host, I have dialogued with thousands of people, of both sexes and from virtually every religious, ethnic and national background. Very early on, I realized that perhaps the major reason for political and other disagreements I had with callers was that they believed people are basically good, and I did not. I believe that we are born with tendencies toward both good and evil. Yes, babies are born innocent, but not good.
Why is this issue so important?
First, if you believe people are born good, you will attribute evil to forces outside the individual. That is why, for example, our secular humanistic culture so often attributes evil to poverty. Washington Sen. Patty Murray, former President Jimmy Carter and millions of other Westerners believe that the cause of Islamic terror is poverty. They really believe that people who strap bombs to their bodies to blow up families in pizzerias in Israel, plant bombs at a nightclub in Bali, slit stewardesses' throats and ram airplanes filled with innocent Americans into office buildings do so because they lack sufficient incomes.
Something in these people cannot accept the fact that many people have evil values and choose evil for reasons having nothing to do with their economic situation. The Carters and Murrays of the West -- representatives of that huge group of naive Westerners identified by the once proud title "liberal" -- do not understand that no amount of money will dissuade those who believe that God wants them to rule the world and murder all those they deem infidels.
Second, if you believe people are born good, you will not stress character development when you raise children. You will have schools teach young people how to use condoms, how to avoid first and secondhand tobacco smoke, how to recycle and how to prevent rainforests from disappearing. You will teach them how to struggle against the evils of society -- its sexism, its racism, its classism and its homophobia. But you will not teach them that the primary struggle they have to wage to make a better world is against their own nature.
I attended Jewish religious schools (yeshivas) until the age of 18, and aside from being taught that moral rules come from God rather than from personal or world opinion, this was the greatest difference between my education and those who attended public and private secular schools. They learned that their greatest struggles were with society, and I learned that the greatest struggle was with me, and my natural inclinations to laziness, insatiable appetites and self-centeredness.
Third, if you believe that people are basically good, God and religion are morally unnecessary, even harmful. Why would basically good people need a God or religion to provide moral standards? Therefore, the crowd that believes in innate human goodness tends to either be secular or to reduce God and religion to social workers, providers of compassion rather than of moral standards and moral judgments.
Fourth, if you believe people are basically good, you, of course, believe that you are good -- and therefore those who disagree with you must be bad, not merely wrong. You also believe that the more power that you and those you agree with have, the better the society will be. That is why such people are so committed to powerful government and to powerful judges. On the other hand, those of us who believe that people are not basically good do not want power concentrated in any one group, and are therefore profoundly suspicious of big government, big labor, big corporations, and even big religious institutions. As Lord Acton said long ago, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Lord Acton did not believe people are basically good.
No great body of wisdom, East or West, ever posited that people were basically good. This naive and dangerous notion originated in modern secular Western thought, probably with Jean Jacques Rousseau, the Frenchman who gave us the notion of pre-modern man as a noble savage.
He was half right. Savage, yes, noble, no.
If the West does not soon reject Rousseau and humanism and begin to recognize evil, judge it and confront it, it will find itself incapable of fighting savages who are not noble.
See also the original article with photo at TownHall.com. You can e-mail the writer at dennisprager@dennisprager.com.
PLAN BY CONYERS AIDS WORKING POOR
By Greg Barrett, Gannett News Service
Federal money to boost training, housing in jointly sponsored billWASHINGTON (12/23/2002)--The most comprehensive bill ever to address U.S. homelessness will be introduced in the 108th Congress in February.
Democratic representatives John Conyers Jr. of Michigan and Julia Carson of Indiana have collaborated on legislation they idealistically dub the "Bringing America Home Act."
The bill proposes funneling federal funds to local governments to assist in affordable housing for the working homeless, job apprenticeship programs, child care vouchers, public transportation, emergency funds for working families on the brink of eviction and one-stop homeless centers to streamline the social service bureaucracy.
"You can provide soup kitchens and homeless shelters, but the hardest thing to do is find affordable housing and permanent jobs," said Conyers' aide Joel Segal, a 1989 law school graduate who was once homeless for four months.
"We can allow working men and women ... to live hand-to-mouth, bouncing around from one homeless shelter to the next feeling degraded and depressed ... or we can reward people who are trying to help themselves," Segal said.
The bill, however, will face a tough sell in a Republican-controlled Congress that must figure out how to finance the war on terrorism and a possible war with Iraq even as some Republicans push for more tax cuts.
No price tag has been fixed to the bill, which is still being vetted by lawmakers, mayors and social workers.
The bill is a complement to the $1.1 billion allocated by President Bush in December for housing and service programs overseen by Housing and Urban Development. That money, a $28 million increase over last year, will go to HUD's Continuum of Care and Emergency Shelter Grant programs in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam.
Homelessness increased nationally in 2002 and is expected to continue upward next year, according to a U.S. Conference of Mayors survey of 25 U.S. cities.
See also the original article with photo at the Detroit News.
FAITH GROUPS BEGIN TO EMBRACE SUSTAINABILITY
From Environmental News ServiceWASHINGTON (12/20/2002)--Religious groups and environmentalists have not always been the closest of allies, but a new report from the Worldwatch Institute finds that this is starting to change. The benefits of cooperation between the two, according to the report's author, could have profound positive impacts for the global environment.
"If the environmental and religious communities were to embrace their central concerns, the progress toward a sustainable society could be vastly improved," said Gary Gardner, director of research at the Worldwatch Institute and author of "Invoking the Spirit: Religion and Spirituality in the Quest for a Sustainable World."
Gardner shared the findings of his report at a luncheon held Thursday at the Worldwatch Insitute in Washington. "This collaboration could change the world," he said. It is only within the past decade that environmental and religious groups have started to work together, Gardner explained. The exact cause of this increased cooperation is hard to pin down he said, but the growing visibility of issues such as climate change, species extinction and rampant consumerism are all factors in the shift.
There is ample logic for environmentalists and religious groups to join forces on some issues, Gardner said, as both view the world in moral terms with nature as having value above simple economics.
Moreover, the two groups have complementary strengths. Environmentalists bring strong scientific and policy backgrounds to the table, and religious groups offer strong moral authority, the capacity to shape worldviews, and large followings as well as financial leverage and social capital.
"We need to acknowledge there is tremendous common good between the two groups," Gardner said.
Environmental initiatives from religious groups are indeed happening and proving successful, he added, and they are occurring throughout the world and across denominations.
For example, during the past six years the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the symbolic leader of the 250 million member Orthodox Church has pulled together scientists, journalists and religious leaders for four week long symposia focusing on water related environmental issues.
In 2002, the Patriarch led a symposium on the environmental threats to the Adriatic Sea that ended with a declaration on environmental protection jointly signed by the Patriarch and Pope John Paul II. Earlier symposia focused on the Black Sea and the Danube River.
Gardner also noted the work of Buddhist monks to stop deforestation in Thailand as well as lobbying work by the World Council of Churches to mitigate climate change. These conservation efforts clearly benefit from the moral authority of the religious leaders involved, he said.
The combined forces of sustainable development advocates and religious groups also have the potential to help shift consumption patterns.
"Cultures are increasingly good at creating consumers but less good at creating citizens," Gardner said, adding that religious groups have a powerful opportunity to levy their large followings with religious teachings that warn of excessive materialism.
These concerns prompted some 3,500 Lutheran, Presbyterian, Unitarian and Quaker congregations to establish the Interfaith Coffee Program, which encourages individuals and institutions to switch to coffee that is traded fairly. The congregations have partnered with Equal Exchange, a worker owned cooperative that sells fairly traded coffee from small-scale farmer co-ops in Latin America, Asia and Africa.
The Episcopal Power and Light initiative has inspired churches in the San Francisco Bay Area to purchase renewable energy for their buildings. In March, Episcopal Power and Light was named the winner of the Energy Globe Award 2002, and staff traveled to Austria for a ceremony where the award was presented by head of Green Cross International, former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.
There is ample opportunity for religious groups to use their significant financial clout to push corporations to change their behavior. A recent campaign led by a broad coalition of religious groups links fuel efficiency to morality and has gathered a wealth of coverage through its "What Would Jesus Drive?" advertisements.
In addition, a group of religious orders recently filed shareholder resolutions with Ford and General Motors to try and get those companies to build more fuel efficient and alternative energy vehicles.
Many of the efforts cited by Gardner do not appear to be direct partnerships between environmentalists and religious groups. Rather, they are religious groups taking on an environmental cause for their own motivations and in their own manner.
This demonstrates that the sides are still a bit wary of each other, Gardner explained, as the ethical and spiritual motives of both sides do not always mesh. Population control initiatives would be a primary example of this, he added, as would differing views on the role of women, the nature of truth and the moral place of humans in the natural order.
"There can be much more collaboration," said Walt Grazer, director of the U.S. Catholic Bishops' Environmental Justice Program, "but there is the danger of environmentalists trying to rent a constituency."
Religious institutions are like "big families," he said, often with diverse viewpoints on environmental issues. It is important for environmental groups to see and respect this challenge, he added, if true collaboration between the two is to take roots. The environmental community does not always own the environmental message, Grazer said. "People are starting to see and internalize the relationship between faith and the environment," said Cassandra Carmichael, a consultant who formerly worked with the environmental grassroots organization the Center For a New American Dream. "It is a great success that this paper has been written and that we are having this discussion."
Carmichael said she'd like to see more environmental groups armed with a staff member dedicated to reaching out to religious organizations, as well as better funding for cooperative initiatives.
A representative from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), who preferred not to be identified, said the department is interested in trying to use President George W. Bush's Faith Based Initiative to fund future projects, although the initiative has not yet been tailored for this.
The opportunities for partnerships between the two communities are boundless, Gardner said, so long as both sides respect their differences while embracing their commonalities.
"This is a great opportunity to reintegrate the societal heart and head," he said. "This is a powerful combination that until recently remained virtually unexplored."
The WorldWatch Institute paper is available online.
Other relevant links:
See also original article with photos at Environmental News Service.
SUPPORT OUR SOURCES!
Life-Net Raw material is used without permission. Please show your appreciation for their services to us by paying some of them a visit or sending them a responsive e-mail.