The silent emergency

Well there's your problem...they don't know that a watched pot never boils!

If the person can't figure out the smoke that is making them cough is bad for them...then the do deserve the darwin award. I think your claims about the deaths being related to the burning the fuel is over stated and under proven...i read the same stuff a couple of months ago and the story was full of holes.

My point isn't to rip yo TL, it is to state that As Sir K hints at and I firmly believe, ignorance and stupidity are the biggest killers around.

[ 10-26-2004, 12:51 PM: Message edited by: MagiK ]

I will also add cruelty to the list of killers.

[Timber Loftis]

Knowing something will kill you and having no choice are two different things. If they don't tend the cook fire, they don't eat.

I know somebody who is starting companies down there to help with sustainability. There are a lot of things about their mentality you don't understand, and I'd love to share the stories over a brewskie someday. Once you talk to someone who works with them, it really opens your eyes. And, yes, some of what they do may really make you think they're stupid.

Here, let me share an example. As I said, I know someone who starts sustainable companies down in Haiti. He makes solar ovens, and these are one way to get the women away from the cookfire. In fact, he feeds a school down there off of 2 industrial sized solar ovens. (Note: you may not have heard of solar ovens, because they need to be out in the direct sunlight all day to work right and are totally impractical here.)

Twice now, this man has given "bonuses" of a week's worth of food to an employee. In each case, the employees took the food, sold all except what they needed to eat today, and bought luxury items like some booze or a dress.

So, the point is, when you live in abject poverty, enjoying a bit today is much more important than planning for a tommorow which may not even come. So, don't give these people too much indignation for not planning for their future health when trying to make today's meals so their family can eat. It's a mentality you simply can't understand.

[Azred]

Originally posted by Aerich: If we're talking about African crises and political will, I'm doubting the situation will change soon. I see African governments spending too much time and money fighting.

I couldn't have said it better myself. There are so many underdeveloped nations whose governmental leaders care only for lining their pockets, as well as those engaged in delivering relief who actually skim off the top and sell the surplus on the black market. Dastardly.

The fundamental solution to this difficulty is education. Remember that baths were once considered a source of disease, as was hand-washing. It would be easy to show how to make simple filters from linen cloth and powderized charcoal to remove various impurities, then follow with boiling the water to remove disease-causing organisms.

[Sir Kenyth]

Good point TL. So where is the blame placed? Where do you start change in this environment?

Remember the old proverb.

"Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he eats for the rest of his life."

[Sir Kenyth]

Originally posted by Azred: quote: Originally posted by Aerich: If we're talking about African crises and political will, I'm doubting the situation will change soon. I see African governments spending too much time and money fighting.

I couldn't have said it better myself. There are so many underdeveloped nations whose governmental leaders care only for lining their pockets, as well as those engaged in delivering relief who actually skim off the top and sell the surplus on the black market. Dastardly.

The fundamental solution to this difficulty is education. Remember that baths were once considered a source of disease, as was hand-washing. It would be easy to show how to make simple filters from linen cloth and powderized charcoal to remove various impurities, then follow with boiling the water to remove disease-causing organisms. [/QUOTE]Crime in the government is certainly a big problem. A lack of road infrastructure is also a problem. A great deal of food goes bad because it can't get to those that need it.

Boiling water is adequate to prevent disease. Settling the water afterward removes most debris. Not running sewage into waterways would help immensely. Another main contributor to the spread of disease is using raw human waste as fertilizer.

Also, baths and hand washing back in the day WAS a source of disease. Bath water was used by a lot of people before being discarded. Hand washing bowls had the same problem. Soap was not the common commodity it is now. The water became a breeding ground for bacteria and shared them amongst the various users.

[ 10-26-2004, 04:31 PM: Message edited by: Sir Kenyth ]

[Timber Loftis]

Good point TL. So where is the blame placed? Where do you start change in this environment?

I don't see a location to place blame, and blame-placing is basically a wasteful endeavor anyway, because solving the problem is what moves things forward. If we're talking water and food shortages in India for instance, there are multiple places to place blame:

1. India's expanding population, which is rampant;
2. A long lack of rain in several parts of the country -- i.e. curses upon Shiva;
3. India's fishing industry, which has basically depleted India's national waters of all fishstocks;
4. The bandicoot, which eats between 10 and 30% of the food stores in any given village each year, often burrowing through concrete or mudd and wattle walls to get at the grain;
5. The Indian religion and Indian beliefs and culture, because the bandicoot problem could certainly be solved if they would simply adopt bandicoot into their daily diet.

See? Hard to place so much blame.

So, let's see how we could fix this stuff. Well, countries unlike my dumbass country, ones who have signed onto Kyoto, can take advantage of the flexible mechanisms once Kyoto becomes effective. One of the flexible mechanisms is the Clean Development Mechanism, which Clinton's State Department got added during all-night negotiations at Kyoto. This provides a wonderful opportunity for a nation with greenhouse gas ("GHG") commitments under Kyoto. How it works is a nation, let's say Germany, that has commitments to reduce its GHG output can INSTEAD go to a developing country, pay to reduce the GHG's in the developing country, and claim the GHG reduction credit at home.

For instance, a clean coal power plant is "new" technology in parts of India, and is cheaper to build than the "newest" technology would be in Germany. So, Germany saves money, cleans up India's air a bit, and claims the GHG reductions at home (India has no reduction goals, so it doesn't mind losing the credits).

As another example, let's turn back to the solar ovens. A country with Kyoto commitments could go build more of those in Haiti, turn them over to a Haitian startup small business to operate, and claim the clean air credits under Kyoto. This would clean Haiti's air (since cook fires are a huge source of air pollution there), benefit Haiti's stressed forests, and also have the added benefit of benefitting the health of the women in Haiti. And, again, it's cheaper to buy a bunch of solar ovens and place them in villages around Haiti than it is to go adding a bunch of $50Million CO2 removal cyclones to power plants in Europe.

So, it is "teach a man to fish," but it is also "teach the developed world that it can achieve a world of good by giving a man a fishing rod and teaching him to fish."

But, my favorite incarnation of that proverb is one that's in somebody's sig quote around here (sorry, but I forget who):
Build a man a fire, and he will be warm for a day; set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[ 10-26-2004, 04:43 PM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]