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We often relate severe acute malnutrition (SAM for its acronym) in children with African countries, but children starve in many more countries and, in some cases, famine is even more spread than in Africa. In India, for instance, 6.4% of children under age 5 suffer from SAM, which is more than twice the number of children starving in Africa (3%). Talking about percentages may seem few people, but 6.4% of children below 5 years of age represent more than 8 million undernourished children, plus the rest of hungry children who also suffer from famine-induced diseases but are not diagnosed severe malnutrition.
There are different criteria to check the degree of malnutrition in children, and one of the most common criteria is measuring their mid-upper-arm circumference: children are considered to suffer from SAM when their mid-upper-arm circumference is less than 115 mm. As it is difficult to imagine, the above picture shows things with a perimeter of about 115 mm.
We know that we have enough means and resources to eradicate world hunger, so we only need some political will: ranking this problem on top of the priority list of our governments, together with universal education. Moreover, in the particular case of SAM, the Indian government should acknowledge it as a disease which can be treated specifically, so that campaigns like those against malaria or tuberculosis could be launched, and not just studies commissioned by the World Bank. Today, with our resources available, any death by hunger should be considered a murder.
(Before accusing us of being too radical, bear in mind that the last sentence is not ours: it’s Jean Ziegler’s, a UN bigwig and former Member of Parliament in Switzerland).
Sources:
- Journal of the Indian Academy of Pediatrics, August 2010. Volume 47, number 8. Special issue on Severe Acute Malnutrition-UNICEF: http://www.indianpediatrics.net/aug2010/current.htm
- Post at Delivering Data about the cost of eradicating world hunger: http://www.deliveringdata.com/2010/11/how-much-money-is-needed-to-eradicate.html
- Who is Jean Ziegler: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Ziegler
If we take a look at mass media (regardless of right- or left-leanings), it is clear that people living in our country but born elsewhere are divided into two groups: foreigners and immigrants. When we talk about Moroccans, Ecuadorians or Senegalese people, for instance, they are not foreigners but immigrants. On the other hand, when we talk about French, Australian or Japanese people they are never immigrants: they are always foreigners. There is only one possibility for those people coming from poor countries to become foreigners: to be millionaires. Needless to say, football players are always foreigners when they play on premier league teams.
Now, let’s take a look at laws regulating foreigners and immigrants in Spain: such discrimination is already present from the very border. According to a Decree published on 11 May 2007, those people who wish to enter our country should prove that they have a minimum daily amount of money to cover their expenses. The funny thing about it (although it’s not funny at all) is that this decree states that the minimum amount of money available should be 10% of the Spanish minimum wage for every day spent in our country. In other words: if the minimum wage in Spain in 2011 amounts to 641.40 € a month, newcomers should prove that they have 64.14 € per person and day. Summing up, it makes 1,924.20 € per person a month. And if we talk about a 4-people family, it is 256.56 € per day, resulting in 7,696.80 € per month.
I do know the budget of our readers at Delivering Data, but quoting Javier Galparsoro in this article, most Spanish people would not be allowed to enter Spain if applying the same laws.
Sources:
- Decree of 11 May 2007 about financial resources to be proved by people who wish to enter Spain: http://www.boe.es/boe/dias/2007/05/11/pdfs/A20390-20391.pdf
- Minimum wage of 2011: http://www.ceo.es/pdf/es/ultima-hora/SMI.pdf
- Article by Javier Galparsoro at Periodismo Humano about this decree: http://conpapeles.periodismohumano.com/2010/05/10/algunos-espanoles-tendriamos-que-irnos/
This week, a package of 20 measures approved by the Spanish Government is going to come into force as part of an energy saving plan. These measures include a 5% discount on the ticket price for suburban and commuting trains, a reduction in road lighting, and a reduction of the speed limit in highways and motorways from 120 km/h to 110 km/h. The later measure is only valid for 4 months and then, on June 30th, it may be cancelled or approved for a longer period of time. As it usually happens with the so-called restrictive measures (indeed, all measures can be considered restrictive), people are swift to react against it, even if arguments are rather demagogic: some critics argue that posting up new speed signals will cost 250,000 € (but they do not mention that this amount represents only 0.01% of the total 2,300 million euros expected to be saved every year thanks to the reduction in energy imports), other critics argue that temporary measures are useless… But critics’ top argument --that is, the argument mostly read in editorials and think pieces and mostly heard in bar chats-- is that reducing the speed limit to 110 km/h involves wasting time in our trips. Indeed, this is irrefutable: we will drive longer for sure. But let’s take a calculator (as Greenpeace does) to check how much time it really is: if we drive a distance of 80 km at 110 km/h instead of 120 km/h, we will waste three minutes and thirty seconds. For a distance of 100 km, we will waste a little bit less than 5 minutes. And even for longer distances, there is not much time wasted: a 300-km trip would involve only 14 more minutes driving.
On the other hand, as fuel consumption increases exponentially in relation to speed, driving at 110 km/h involves a reduction of up to 2 litres of fuel for every 100 km. Less money, less fuel and less pollution.
Finally, another argument posed by critics is that this measure it typically Spanish, in the pejorative sense of the term. My reply is to remind you of other “typically-Spanish” countries with a speed limit of 110 km/h: Sweden, Denmark, Ireland, United Kingdom…
Sources:
- Speed limit to 110 km/h: http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publish/article_29378.shtml
- Arguments against this law: http://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2011/02/25/espana/1298657509.html
- Greenpeace calculations: http://www.greenpeace.org/espana/es/Blog/110-o-120-kmh-en-las-autopistas/blog/33488?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social_network&utm_term=km&utm_content=transporte&utm_campaign=cambio+climatico
- Paper about energy saving: http://ecomovilidad.net/barcelona/es/castellano-consideraciones-sobre-la-limitacion-de-110-kmh
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