Us humans have a tendency to strive for more, to want the best. Most of the time that's pretty awesome; it can help us to achieve our goals and become more fulfilled. But sometimes in striving for the ideal, we can forget to celebrate the progress we have made.
A classic example of the above is the progress on the Millennium Development Goals. There is a lot of criticism of them and yes, they omitted certain factors, yes, we might not achieve them all and yes, there have been issues in their delivery BUT - and this is a big but - there have been some truly amazing changes.
We have reduced extreme poverty by half.
Child mortality rates have dropped by nearly half.
Maternal mortality rates have dropped by 45%.
An estimated 3.3 million malaria deaths were averted (between 2000 and 2012) thanks to intervention. ~90% of those would have been sub-Saharan African children under 5.
22 million tuberculosis deaths were averted (since 1995).
The incidence of HIV infection in sub-Saharan Africa has dropped by over 50%.
The proportion of underweight under fives in Bangladesh has reduced by 25% (1990-2012)
The number of children not attending primary school has reduced from 102 million in 2000, to 58 million in 2012.`
We have got substantially closer to gender parity in education.
The participation of women in politics has increased substantially.
And millions of lives are being saved by access to better drinking water.
Now granted we still have a long way to go, but come on...that's pretty amazing right?
We totally have the capacity for large scale positive change.
If this has left you thinking, "but what can I do?" here are a few suggestions:
- Buy Fair Trade. Tea bags, bananas, chocolate - pay growers a fair price.
- Sponsor a child via a legitimate organisation who spread benefit across whole communities via initiatives such as clean water, crop irrigation, school houses and supplies for school children.
- Stop buying from known sweatshop environments.
- Give canned goods to food-banks to help hunger in your community or donate to your local soup kitchen.
- When travelling abroad, try to invest in local communities and pay fair prices.
- Put pressure on your local MP and your government to take action on issues that matter to you.
- Reduce your environmental footprint - take the bus, fly less frequently, eat vegetarian food more often.
- Learn more about being an ethical consumer.
- Choose a project of interest and donate to a legitimate charity that uses funds to establish and maintain projects where needed.
