By Suzanne York, HowMany.org In less than a month the world, or at least the environmentally-inclined members of the world, will be in the throes of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD), or Rio+20. Despite the official summit focus on the green economy and sustainable development, there are many groups and individuals working
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, May 30, 2012 During a week spent ensconced in the depths of the concept of degrowth at the Degrowth in the Americas conference, it was encouraging to find that population issues were interwoven into plenaries and workshops throughout the week. The issue is often viewed as taboo and/or the elephant in
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, May 16, 2012 Many topics were under discussion at the second full day of Degrowth in the Americas Conference: finance and degrowth, transition towns, resilient communities, public banking, and much more. The topic that most resonated with me, most likely because of their perspective on living in harmony with nature, was
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By Suzanne York, May 15, 2012 A full agenda was on tap here at the first main day of the Degrowth in the Americas conference. Below is some of what was discussed at the morning session, which set the stage for this week-long event. It kicked off with a showing of the film Journey of
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By Suzanne York, May 11, 2012 If you think there is one issue that could gain bi-partisan support in the U.S. Congress, ending child marriage would likely be near the top of the list. Not only would a little bi-partisanship be good for the country, but preventing girls from marrying too young would improve lives.
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, May 3, 2012 It’s getting down to the wire for preparations for Rio+20, the United Nations follow-up to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In the past week or two, there have been several important developments regarding the issues of population growth, youth and reproductive health, human
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, April 18, 2012 In her TED talk in early April, Melinda Gates of the Gates Foundation mentioned that if the state of Uttar Pradesh (UP) in India were its own country, it would be the fifth largest in the world, with over 200 million people. And in this populated land,
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, April 9, 2012 Happiness is back in the news, at least at the United Nations. If you paid close attention, you were reminded that the UN unanimously adopted a resolution last year based on the concept of Gross National Happiness. Officially called UN Resolution 65/309, “Happiness: towards a holistic approach to
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By Suzanne York, HowMany.org, April 2, 2012 It’s very hard to comprehend that here we are in the 21st century, living in a supposedly advanced and democratic nation, and there is a huge debate about women’s rights – namely women’s access to and use of contraceptives in the United States. As a Generation X’er,
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By Kelly White, July 21, 2011 Photo: somewhereintheworldtoday Projecting population growth is not an exact science, so when the United Nations chose October 31, 2011, Halloween, as the day that world population will surpass 7 billion, one has to wonder as to why
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