Some Good News for 2020
The platitudes of the New Year for us Westerners always seem to be about the resolution, the ‘Veganuary’ or ‘Dry January’. And always we see folks on social media declaring that the old year can ‘do one.
And right now, we have a terrifying geopolitic and Australia is on fire. The whole continent’s economy is going to take an awful slap and the extinction event scale is evil. Half a billion animals and many habitats gone, such that several species will now be declared extinct in the wild. Sigh…
So here, as is my wonted urge, is some GOOD stuff about 2019.
To start with, 138 seal pups were born in the Thames in 2019, fifty years after the river was declared ‘Biologically Dead’. I love that!
India reported that its population of tigers has risen by over a third since 2014, and in Siberia, an unprecedented collaboration between China and Russia has paved the way for a new transnational park for the Amur leopard and the Siberian tiger. – and that is about habitat restoration.
Algeria and Argentina officially eliminated malaria this year, and the WHO said that in the last eight years, malaria infections in Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam dropped by 76%, and deaths fell by 95%. India also reported a huge reduction in malaria, with 2.6 million fewer cases in 2018 than in 2017 – proving it can be beaten.
The Philippines passed a Universal Health Care Act, entitling all of its 107 million citizens to health insurance and medical treatment, and Malaysia started providing free healthcare insurance for the country’s poorest 40%, providing coverage against 36 critical illnesses. – My mum would have loved that!
Democracy is proving far more resilient than the headlines suggest. Since 2000, the number of democracies has risen from ninety to ninety-seven, including eleven countries that became democratic for the first time ever, and in 2019, two billion people in fifty countries voted, the largest number in history – even if our own election was really vexatious!
The World Health Organisation removed ‘gender identity disorder’ from its list of mental illnesses – another one my mum would have approved! Along with this.. In a landmark victory for Africa’s human rights activists, Botswana decriminalised homosexuality, overturning a colonial-era law, and Angola decriminalised homosexuality, overturning the penal code it also inherited from colonisation.
This one makes me feel good – The world’s largest multilateral financial institution, The European Investment Bank, agreed to stop all financing for fossil fuels, and committed to investing half of its entire annual outlay — not just its energy budget — on climate action and sustainability by 2025.
I had no idea about this one, either.. The world’s largest car supplier, Bosch, said it will be fully carbon neutral by 2020, making it the first major industrial company to take that step.
But this is the best: The United Kingdom, generated more electricity from wind, sun, water and biomass in the third quarter of the year than from coal, oil and gas.
So in the face of a new and worrying time, there is some good stuff! Here is to 2020 being as good as it can be for you all.
Adam
:-)))