By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org Worldwide, 2.5 billion people lack access to proper sanitation.  That is nearly 40% of the world’s population. In fact, more people have a cell phone than a toilet. That is why World Toilet Day is recognized on November 19th.   A project of UN Water, the day is meant “to raise awareness
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org There is an African proverb that says “if you want to go fast, go alone.  If you want to go far, go together.” Last month, at the Bioneers conference, Eve Ensler (yes, that Eve Ensler of Vagina Monologues fame), gave a stirring and emotional talk about her work with women in
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org Family planning efforts are mainly directed at women, which makes sense.  Yet too often men are disregarded, and they should be part of most discussions on family planning. Involving both men and women will not only help families, but the environment too. One overlooked topic when it comes to women, men
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org There has been some hoopla over a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) about how decreasing human population numbers is not a quick fix for environmental problems. Well, of course it’s not a quick fix.  Nothing really is, short of a catastrophe.  The two authors
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org For several years now, the topic that water would be the next oil has been bandied about, implying that water would be as valuable as fossil fuels. That day of reckoning may be coming sooner than many people think.  Last week, Reuters reported that the city of São Paulo – South
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org The theme of this past weekend’s Bioneers Summit Conference was “revolution from the heart of nature,” but more than that, it was also that land and life are sacred. If you aren’t familiar with Bioneers, it is an annual conference that just celebrated its 25th year. Attendees are referred to as
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org The stock market is up and down, oil companies are making record profits, there is a growing gap between the have’s and the have nots, a large number of people take anti-depressants, and the environment is increasingly being degraded.  Do we accept this as the way it is, or is there
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org Last week, on International Day of the Girl– a day recognized by the UN “to help galvanize worldwide enthusiasm for goals to better girls’ lives” – the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to two people working on behalf of children’s rights. Malala Yousafzai, the teenager shot by the Taliban two years
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org The Living Planet Report 2014, an analysis of undertaken by World Wildlife Fund, the London Zoological Society, and a few other groups, just reported sobering and disturbing news:  the world is losing more species than originally thought, with the state of global wildlife populations halved in 40 years. The opening paragraph
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By Suzanne York, www.howmany.org To show how far we have come as a civilized society, and how far we still have to go, the organization Engender Health recently released a video (see below) on past types of rather frightening forms of contraception in honor of World Contraception Day (September 26). While there are many ways to
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