EARTHKEEPING NEWS
A NEWSLETTER OF THE NORTH AMERICAN COALITION FOR CHRISTIANITY AND ECOLOGY

Volume Two, Number Six
July/August 1993

CALL TO ACTION:
10 DAYS' MILITARY SPENDING ON BEHALF OF THE CHILDREN

The human world has grown beyond its limits. The problems of over population and over consumption cross all borders and are linked to the most serious problems we face on this planet. Fortunately, we know both how to decrease population growth and lower consumption. The solutions are affordable and we have successful models to follow.

To reduce population growth we must:

  1. Improve the status of women — eliminate female illiteracy; increase women's education, employment, income, ability to own property; and give women control over their own bodies.
  2. Improve health care, especially for women and children, to reduce infant mortality rates. When more children survive, people choose to have fewer children.
  3. Make voluntary family planning services available and affordable to all people worldwide.

To reduce consumption of resources we need to develop renewable sources of energy and use energy and resources more efficiently.

The leaders of 148 nations have signed the Declaration and Plan of Action from the 1990 World Summit for Children. If implemented, by the year 2000 the plan will: provide universal access to basic education, reduce child death rates by 33%, reduce maternal death rates and child malnutrition by 50% and provide every family access to appropriate family planning.

The Declaration states, "We are prepared to make available the resources to meet these commitments." UNICEF estimates that to reach the Summit goals will require additional commitments annually of $25 billion worldwide. We can pay for the costs of these programs with money redirected from current government spending, particularly military spending.

The nations of the world spend $25 billion preparing for war every 10 days. Will the world's leaders find 10 days' military spending to keep their promise to the world's children? This is a matter critical to planetary security!

Time to Act

In preparation for a major UN Conference on Population and Development (UNCPD) to be held in Cairo, Egypt, in September 1994, write to President Clinton asking that the American delegation go with a concrete plan for how the US will confront the twin problems of population and consumption.

Write your Congressperson and Senators, urging them to commit 10 days' worth of US military spending annually, to meet the commitment we made by signing the World Declaration and Plan of Action for the Survival, Protection and Development of Children. This would be the US part of the estimated additional $25 billion world - wide that it will take to reach the goals set at the Summit for Children

Information from EarthAction, 30 Cottage St., Amherst MA 01002, (413) 549-8118.

NOTE - you can also write Senator Patrick Leahey, chairman of the Senate Appropriations foreign operations subcommittee, urging the appropriation of the full amount committed by the USA to provide world wide access to family planning. (Information from the Sierra Club, Washington DC, 202-547-1141).

THE BIBLE, BABBITT AND BIODIVERSITY

James Watt, Ronald Reagan's first Interior secretary, and Bruce Babbitt, current Secretary of the Interior, share one thing in common. Both read a mandate into their readings of the Bible. For Watt, it was the Second Coming, which he invoked in 1981 to downplay the need for conservation: "I don't know how many future generations we can count on before the Lord returns."

For Babbitt, it's Genesis and Noah's ark: "My predecessors were always invoking the Bible in aid of development and construction. I read the story of Noah and the ark as a parable of stewardship ... of the Biblical command to preserve the diversity of God's creation."

Washington Post, June 36, 1993, Jack Anderson and Michael Binstein .

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