A time for lists

On the last week of the year, mass media offer lists about the most important pieces of news, the blockbuster films, the best-selling books, the best goals or the prettiest celebrities of the year.
Among all these lists, one of the most amazing is the list of the world’s wealthiest people, published by Forbes. However, we should say “wealthiest men” because there are only 4 women included in the fist 50 top rich people. And this list is published worldwide because it seems that everybody wants to know who the richest man on Earth is. Every Christmas, we are reminded that the Mexican Carlos Sim and the Americans Bill Gates and Warren Buffett are the top three, and the Spanish Amancio Ortega is the fifth thanks to his clothing merchandiser Inditex, including brands like Zara.
However, this list never questions the legitimacy of such fortunes. And it is never said that any of the three richest men on Earth, with a wealth of more than 44 billion dollars, is rich enough to end up with the world’s famine for one year, according to FAO. If we take the top five rich men, they have enough money to eradicate the world’s hunger for six years.
This kind of comparison is usually labelled as demagogic because life is never so simple, but in this case it is. Only if one of these men decided to do things differently, the world could make a positive change. However, if they are the richest men on Earth, they are not likely to be willing to change society.

Sources:

1. Forbes magazine: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbes
2. Forbes’s with the world’s billionaires: http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/list/
3. A post at Delivering Data about how much money is needed to eradicate world hunger: http://www.deliveringdata.com/2010/11/how-much-money-is-needed-to-eradicate.html

   
    
   
  

How much water is on Earth?

It is estimated that the total amount of water in and on the Earth (including saline and fresh water, liquid and solid water in icecaps, groundwater and surface water) amounts to 1,400 million cubic kilometres –that is, about 332,500,000 cubic miles, which is such a large number that we cannot get a clear picture of it.
This water is distributed as a thin layer with a maximum-low depth of 11,000 metres in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the world’s oceans located in the western Pacific Ocean. Taking into account that the Earth radius is more than 6,000 km, this trench is not very deep. Jacques Cousteau, the well-known French oceanographer, used a very graphic explanation to understand how thin this layer of water is: if we immerse a billiard ball into water and then dry it with a towel, the moisture film on the surface of this ball will be proportionally higher than the amount of water on our planet. However, this thin layer takes up 71% of the world’s surface, so most of the Earth is water-covered.
This amount of water has been invariable since it first appeared 4,500 million years ago. Water is neither destroyed nor created, so it will always remain the same. However, what is not the same –be it natural or man made—is the condition and distribution of this water.
 
How much is drinking water?
Only 2.5% of the planet’s water can be considered fresh water for its low saline contents. Most terrestrial ecosystems and its species (including humans) need fresh water to survive, so even if it is not a scarce resource, it is a limited resource. Out of this 2.5% of fresh water, 79% is found in the icecaps, 20% is groundwater and only 1% is on the surface. Moreover, out of this 1% of surface water, 50% is in lakes, 38% is soil moisture, 8% is in the atmosphere, 1% is found in living beings (like us) and 1% in rivers. In short: accessible drinking water represents only 0.008% of the total available water in our planet. Get this picture to better understand it: if we could include all the Earth water into a 5-litre container, fresh water would be a teaspoonful, but humans could only drink a couple of droplets from it.

Sources:

1. These data are taken from the book Guía de bolsillo para personas inquietas: http://www.intermonoxfam.org/es/informate/productos/libros/ciencias-sociales/guia-de-bolsillo-para-personas-inquietas
2. You can read this book online here: http://books.google.es/books?id=a7vZ4P8KlssC&printsec=frontcover&hl=es&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

   
   
   
   

How do we spend our money?

At the end of October 2012, the Spanish National Institute of Statistics published the Survey of family budget 2011 to check how Spaniards spend their money. This report concludes that the average household expenditure in 2011 amounted to 29,482 € --that is, 1% less than in 2010. The rent item shows the greatest increase, whereas car purchase has been reduced a lot.
But beyond these conclusions, this survey helps us understand our set of values and how we do spend our little money: Spanish households spend 272 € every year in press, books and stationery, standing for 0.9% of our family budget, whereas we spend 894 € in phone services, which represents 3% of our budget. Education represents 1.1 % (311 €), which is less than our budget for shoes (382 €, 1.3%). Medication, pharmaceutical products and other health material represents 1.3% of our expenditure (374 €), which is less than our expenditure in tobacco (436 €, 1.5%). And finally, flowers, pets and other leisure items or equipment stand for 1% (386 €) and jewellery stands for 0.7% (207 €), more or less like our expenditure in press and books.
How does the financial crisis affect our consumption? If we take a look at the family budget of 2006, we’ll realise that the item “press and books” has been reduced in 20.5%, but tobacco has increased in 11.4%.

Sources:

1. The Spanish National Institute of Statistics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instituto_Nacional_de_Estad%C3%ADstica_%28Spain%29
2. Survey of family budgets 2011: http://www.ine.es/en/prensa/epf_prensa_en.htm

   
   
    

Light against the death penalty

On 30 November 1786, that is 226 years ago, death penalty was abolished in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. It was the first time that a European country legally abolished this penalty. Leopold I, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, as enlightened prince, introduced this reform of the penal code, as well as other laws to boost trade, industry and agrarian productivity, and he suppressed the naval force kept up by the Medici.
To celebrate the first abolition of the death penalty in Europe, the Community of Sant’Egidio, together with 300 more organizations worldwide, launched the international campaign Cities for life to fight against death penalty in the world. For 10 years, every 30 November, more than 1,500 cities around the world light some of their most emblematic buildings to raise public awareness against executions. According to a report drawn by Amnesty International, in 2011 there were 676 people executed in 20 different countries, not including the thousands of people believed to be executed in China, where these figures are top secret. Some other countries like Iran also keep a secret list of executions not included as official information, so the total amount of executed people could double the officially reported figures.
So far, death penalty is abolished in 140 countries. It is quite a major step if we take into account that by the end of the 60s only 55 countries followed the example of Tuscany. At present, there are still 58 countries where death penalty is legal, even if not always applied.
As of 31 December 2011, there were 18,750 people under death sentence worldwide in the death row of many prisons.

Sources:

1. The Grand Duchy of Tuscany: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Duchy_of_Tuscany
2. Leopold I, Grand Duke of Tuscany (later on known as Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor):  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_II,_Holy_Roman_Emperor
3. Community of Sant’Egidio: http://www.santegidio.org/index.php?langID=en
4. Cities for Life campaign: http://nodeathpenalty.santegidio.org/
5. Death penalty in 2011, according to Amnesty International: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/ACT50/001/2012/en/241a8301-05b4-41c0-bfd9-2fe72899cda4/act500012012en.pdf

   
   
   
   

Deconstructing international cooperation

The investment of public resources in international cooperation has never been too generous. During the 90s, citizens pushed governments of rich countries into donating 0.7% of their gross national product to cooperation projects, but so far only five countries (Denmark, the Netherlands, Luxemburg, Norway and Sweden) meet this target. The rest of countries don’t, with an average contribution of only 0.3%. And even worse, with the current financial crisis, there have been some cuts in international cooperation budgets. In Spain, regional governments have cut in four years this budget meant for official development assistance (ODA) in 71%.
During the 10th annual meeting of NGO regional coordination held some days ago in Bilbao (Spain), regional governments were reported to go on with such dramatic cuts in 2013. Regional governments are expected to cut an extra 44% on ODA: from the current 240 millions to just 134 million euros.
This dramatic cut has direct consequences: many health, education and nourishment projects in Third World countries are now blocked, and most of the on-going projects are likely to be blocked too at this rate. Moreover, the budget for development education also suffers cuts, affecting all the programmes and campaigns of social awareness and advocacy meant to promote cooperation among Spanish citizens, as well as the importance of individual actions (like what and where we buy things) in our global world.
Contrary to the (relatively) significant social support shown in the demonstrations against the cuts in education and health, cutting the cooperation budget does not seem to be considered unacceptable, as if international cooperation could be left aside during our financial crisis. Maybe we are not aware of the importance of cooperation projects. After all, it is not such a huge budget. By cutting in international cooperation, our financial problems will not get solved: regional cooperation only means 5 euros/year per citizen. However, the defence budget represents 368 euros/year per citizen: we’d rather learn to cut better!

Sources:

1. The five countries donating 0.7% of their gross national product to cooperation: http://www.oecd.org/investment/aidstatistics/developmentaidrosein2009andmostdonorswillmeet2010aidtargets.htm
2. The data for this post are taken from official documents of the 10th annual meeting of NGO regional coordination (in Spanish): http://www.congde.org/index.php/noticias/vernoticia/id_noticia/1791