Youth’s Ecoparlement

Our way of consumption uses rapidly up our natural resources and we know that they will not last forever- Their extraction, and especially the fact that they have to be transformed to be turned into a consumable product, provoke, a part from other consequences, CO2 emissions. These emissions are mainly responsible for the climatic changes.
These climatic changes are felt all over the world, but they reach great proportions in zones were life conditions are already difficult.
A great number of countries, already affected by lack of food or drinking water, if we choose only to mention these two problems, are today at the edge of implosion.
It is therefore evident that our consumption habits are in a great part responsible of all these planetary changes

Becoming a responsible consumer imposes itself as a priority and the future of our planet is in the hands of the new generation, meaning us, tomorrow’s deciders.

Let's not forget, if we want to talk about endurable development that magnificent mention of Saint-Exupéry:
"Earth is a heritage that we borrow from our children."

Nowadays, we know, because our elders, our teachers, confess their mistakes and act to inform us. And we are lucky to know. But, does everyone have that right, that possibility?

We have nowadays in our hands fabulous tools to act, like 21 Agenda (global, local, in groups). But, why do we talk about local 21 Agenda if we don’t decide to create our personal 21 Agenda?

Yes, each of us has to behave like responsible consumers, being capable of criticising tricky publicity that excites our purchasing.
Yes, we have to recycle, reuse, understand the mechanism, the motive and convince our entourage.
Yes, we have to wonder about the "fair price" of our purchases if we want to act efficiently and durably.

We are convinced about all that, and even if it is sometimes complicated to apply our convictions, we must achieve this, because there's no other chance.
Our worries are thus others.

We have to face urgent problems, those problems which poison human being's daily life. We know there are a lot of those, but certain ones seem to be in capital letters.

· HUNGER IN THE WORLD
· THE RIGHT OF EDUCATION FOR ALL

We’ve heard about exterior debpt a long time ago, our countries are helping the countries in debpt repay them, but what for? To open as soon as possible a new debpt to restart our economy?
We arent going to solve this problem of hunger in the world while cultivating industrial use plants to satisfy our need of gas.
Meanwhile, the price of basic material such as cereal are rising scandelously and poor countries will once again be in debpt.
Speaking of debpts, aren’t we also in debt to crush these countries under the weight of our needs?
Us, the youth, must protest against such inegality wich we do not understand
To protest, it´s thinking, and that’s already good.
But what´s the use if we just wait for things to change?
Everybody, react! Let’s unionize our efforts and show our parents, our theachers that we are able to take that challenge.
Thanks to their help and support, we are starting to react but we must stay in control of the situation and surpass ourselves
Let’s quote this phrase by Gandhi: “Misery is the greatest source of pollution”.
That’s our project and this is what we propose you to do with us:
· A race against hunger
We´ve done it last year and we collected 9 000€ for Burundi (Africa). This year our objective is to collect 15 000€
It’s immediate and quite easy but it’s still charity.
But we still must do it because it´s unbearable that 24 000 people die daily of starvation while we are being picky with the fodd that is given to us.
We must also react ecologicly so that our help becomes more and more frequent and punctual.
How?
By favorising the right of education for all, the only reliable way to extinguish misery
Donations to poor classes seems like a good example of what we can do, because it helps them be more independent of us thanks to education.

The 3º pupils

Translated to English by:
Laura Gardner, Amaia Urgoiti et Alex Ronin

Race against the hunger

Today 800 millions of people suffer hunger in the world, 2 billion suffer food deficiencies, nearly 3 billion live with 1 euro per day.We can’t imagine the consequences in 2050, when the world population reaches 9 billion people.
Four multinationals share 90% of the agro-chemical industries’ world trade, weed killers, pesticides and seeds’owners. And to fight hunger is not really part of their aims.
Meanwhile, the countries of the OCDE (the richest nations) devote each year 350 billion euros to the agricultural subsidies which unbalance the world market. At the same time, they pour 8 billion euros to support agriculture in the developing countries.

Which are the solutions?

- To improve the outputs by using more chemicals, but we are already saturated.
- To reduce our meat consumption (10 kilos of fodder are necessary to the production of one kilo of meat).
- It could be a solution but the world bank anticipates on the contrary that the world meat consumption will increase by 50% from today until 2020.
- To clear tropical forests... it’s already in progress for the cereal plantation of industrial use (to manufacture 50 litres of agro-diesel it is necessary to burn 232kg corn and with that a Zambian or Mexican child can live one year.)
- The solutions suggested today are not ready for use to solve the problem, on the contrary... and we do not take the enormous environmental risks into account
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- What can we do?
- It is not only what we produce which will determine the future of the agriculture, but also what we consume.
- It is our consumer behaviour which contributes to guide the evolution of our society। Because our purchases are at the origin of modes of production.- Can we deplore hunger in the world but not use our consumer capacity to fight against social injustice?
- Can we denounce the unceasingly increasing CO2 emissions?

Although, the fight against hunger in the world is not our responsibility, we cannot remain passive with 24,000 dead people per day.

The situation is more than urgent in several countries: 38 of 53 African countries have to import food to be able to fill up their food structural deficit and in front of the explosion in prices they can’t buy the bare essentials. We, pupils of the Lycée Français de Bilbao, have decided to mobilize and to take part in the race against hunger; the 12th race will take place on May 16th, 2008. Last year we already took part in this race, which allowed us to collect 9,000 Euros, which were later sent to Burundi.
This year we have decided to reach at least to 15,000 Euros and we have to find up the way.
Among the ideas to develop
Massive participation.
Make other schools take part as well.
To transform the race into a real party.
To avoid waste and to suggest this day as the day of sustainable development.
But first of all, to understand this serious problem better, to be able to tell others about it and at the same time to motivate them to take part with us or to help us financially, it is important and essential to make a consciousness raising campaign.
Wide program and of course, it is urgent!
A meeting will take place very soon between the direction of our school and the tutors. During this meeting I am going to suggest the creation of a commission of pupils, because I think that this initiative has to be transformed into a " youth action".
All your ideas are welcome and this is this blog’s aim.
Marta Smith et Claudia Ortuondo