Terrorism as a global issue

Terrorism is the global problem nowadays that endanger life of every person on the earth. If we want to solve the problem of Global Terrorism, we have to find the roots to it, we have to analyze the actions of countries taken against terrorism.

Mass media is currently struggling active against terrorism,  but they just blame whole nations without anything.

Terrorism is a systematic use of terror, often violent. With terrorism they intent to create fear in people.

Lately it has been easy to understand that this is an global issue.

-      -     Al Quaeda and his group attacked 80 different countries on September 11, 2001.

-        -   Over 6,000 US soldiers killed in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Possibly 100 times that number of civilians in those countries. Also a lot of soldiers from other nations like Norway.

The nations take this problem really serious, and they have made several new rules to prevent terrorism. Unfortunately does it still happened.

Some things they’ve done is at the Airport there are much stricter rules. Now you can’t carry any parfume/liquid. They have also made it much stricter to get across borders in some nations.

Through the General Assembly they have been trying to coordinate their counter-terrorism. They have also been active countering Terrorism through resolutions and by establishing several subsidiary bodies.

Endangered Species

1.      The global issue when it comes to endangered species are many, and it can occur to be a problem in the nearest future. One issue is that if a specie gets extinguished, it can affect the rest of a food chain and other species can be endangered as well. If this leads on to elimination of specie, it is in fact a problem for the next generation or century. We try our best to keep the endangered species alive so these animals can carry on in the future. It would be a shame to have lost a specie forever. There are many extraordinary animals that are dying out and are unique and beautiful in their own way. An examples of this are the Siberian Tiger.

2.      2. The IUCN red list is a list of all the species in the world that are extinguished, in danger of being and so on. This is a global issue because if one animal specie gets extinguished it can affect a whole food change and maybe lead to extinguishing of even more species as mentioned earlier in the text.

3.     3. Global warming: Leads to extinguishing of for example the polar bear

Overhunting: For example if you hunt down so many animals that the population can’t keep up.

4/5: Endagered species is a global issue which means that the whole world have to work together in order to help the population or the specie the nations have to make an agreement for how much of that specie you can fish or hunt, they may even have to preserve or protect that specie.

6: Global warming is an issue that connects with the issue of endangered species. Global warming has contributed to the melting of the ice in North Pole, which removes the hunting area for polar bears. This means the polar bears can’t have access to food and slowly die out. That is one example of the consequences global warming is interfering in the issue of endangered species. 

Marius, Tor Frithjof and Wetle 

What is Human Trafficking?

Human trafficking is a form of modern day slavery. Millions of people worldwide live and suffer in slave-like situations. According to the United Nations, human trafficking is ranked as the third greatest revenue source of organized crime just after narcotics and arms. While the U.S. Department of State estimates that 800,000 – 900,000 people are trafficked across borders annually, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and many other organizations taking the lead to eradicate trafficking put the number above 2 million. Adding domestic trafficking to those numbers, which is defined as people trafficked within the borders of one nation, the number reaches almost 4 million persons trafficked per year. Trafficked victims are often deceived, forced, or coerced into vulnerable situations that make it easy for the traffickers to hold them in forced labor and/or slavery. The overwhelming majority of victims of trafficking are women and girls. These women are often also victims of war, poverty, discrimination, and violence.

 

 We think that this happens a lot in poor countries with bad societies where nobody cares when you got raped or kidnapped. Or a lot of people in countries like this sell their child to different child traffickers because they need money to survive.

       People think like this because they need money, and then they start to do crazy things to get it. They use other people to get this money, and they even are willing to risk their life's to get it.

 

   One of today’s biggest human rights crises is the international trafficking of women and girls (and, to a lesser extent, boys) into sex slavery. Human trafficking is the third largest criminal industry in the world, outranked only by arms and drug dealing. The United Nations estimates that trafficking in persons generates $7 to $10 billion annually for traffickers. The number of people trafficked each year is estimated by most experts to be in the millions. Given its current growth rate, which is fuelled by its high profitability, low investigation rate and low prosecution rate, human trafficking is expected by some to take over drug trafficking as the second largest criminal industry in the world within the next decades.

 

 

Ragnhild F. og Henriette

Volunteer Work

Volunteer work, generally looked upon as a selfless act by most people. Volunteering is intended for people who are not or at least not greatly affected by a problem and/or issue regarding other people. The idea is to improve others quality of life by giving some of our time dedicated to help them for nothing in return (that is the idea).

A good example showing that volunteer work is a global issue is the websites http://www.globalvolunteernetwork.org/ and http://www.yci.org.

The cause of volunteer work is often other global issues such as poverty, trafficking, endangered species or similar problems. It often starts here and some of those who are not affected choose to volunteer to help the cause.

Generally organizations of all sizes are the ones who deals with volunteer work. And usually will be your best bet of getting into it, if you were to be interested in doing so.

This global issue is often interconnected with other issues in the sense that volunteer work is often something happening after a disaster or a tragic happening of sorts. But it doesn’t have to be, it could be for people who do not share the same quality of life as we do. Or just raising money for a cause people are unaware of.

Consumption

In 2005 there was a report made by 1360 scientists from 95 countries. They warn that almost two-thirds of the natural machinery that supports life on Earth is being used up. Reports show that in 50 years, all the oil will be gone. In almost every part of our daily lives we rely on the support of oil. We wear oil every day, we also eat oil. Actually, oil is not only important for transport, but it is also in our clothing, food, medicine and energy systems. We are so dependent on oil. We know the day when we have drained up all the oil will come, but will we be ready? I think we must prepare. If not we will get a huge shock.

The human demand for food, water, fuel, timber etc. has been higher the last 60 years than in the 18^th and 19^th centuries combined. Because of our high consumption, other species on the earth are becoming endangered, and some are exterminated. It’s not only the animals that are affected, but we also destroy the nature. Since 1980, about 35% of mangroves have been lost, 20% of the world’s coral reefs have been destroyed and another 20% badly degraded.

We have a high consumption of timber. It’s so high that the rainforests are being destroyed. Every year an area of the size of New Jersey is cut down and destroyed. The plants and animals that used to live there will either die, or must find a new place to live. It is really dumb to cut down all the rainforests. Only 2% of the Earth’s surface is covered in rainforests, and about two-thirds of all animal species lives there. The forests also help us in our fight against global warming, by producing oxygen.

The government tries to prevent the high consumption. First of all, we have to share more with the third world and the richest have to use less. More than 2 billion people live on less than 2$ a day. The diagram below shows the private consumption of the rich, middle-class and the poor people in the world.

Several agreements have been made to make the world a better place, like the Kyoto protocol. The Kyoto protocol is all about using less to prevent the natural resources. But countries like China and USA didn’t sign the protocol, because they thought that they didn’t have a standing chance to use less to prevent the CO₂ in the atmosphere. An Important person named Al Gore had big success when he made a film about Global issues.

He made a big documentary where he presented some of the most important global issues. This documentary made people realize how big the problem really was, and movies like these can be important, because we need to know what we are dealing with. Other big Medias have also made films about global warming, and the consumption that we have. Movies like: 2012, The day after tomorrow, Waterworld, The day the earth stood still, and an inconvenient truth. In movies like these, you see how the world can end because of our use.

I will conclude with that we need to think about what we use, and if we really need to use it. If every person thought about that, and tried to contain their private consumption, it would have been a really big step for the world.

- Marcus & Mikael

Global Issue - Refugees

A refugee is a person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or natural disaster. When people are given the status as refugees they are immediately guarantied protection of their basic human rights. And while being a refugee it’s not possible to be forced to return to the home country.

 The most important parts of the refugee definition are:

• Refugees have to be outside their country of origin;
• The reason for their flight has to be a fear of persecution;
• The fear of persecution has to be well-founded
• The persecution has to result from one or more of the 5 grounds listed in the definition, that is race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion;
• They have to be unwilling or unable to seek the protection of their 'source' country.

In 2011, there were 15.2 million refugees around the world. It is also estimated that 80 per cent of the refugees are women and children. The leading countries of origin of refugees in 2011 are; Afghanistan with 2.7 million refugees, Iraq with 1.4 million, Somalia with 1.1 million, Sudan with 500 000 and The Democratic Republic of Congo with 491 000 refugees.

The reason for this global problem is mainly war. Too many people have fled their home country scared and with hope to find a better life, although they are not allowed to settle in the country they fled too, but still away from persecution. There are also issues regarding natural disasters. For example in Japan, after the tsunami in 2011 125.000 buildings and homes were damaged or destroyed leaving 350.000 people without homes and no reason to stay in Japan. Africa has also been the in the middle of horror and suffering. For example a record 107,500 African refugees and migrants made the dangerous journey from the Horn of Africa to Yemen in 2012. This is the largest influx into Yemen since 2006 when UNHCR began compiling these statistics. The previous record was in 2011 when more than 103,000 people arrived in Yemen by sea. The reason for Africans to escape to Yemen, for example, and then looked upon as refugees are of the reasons mentions above: “The fair of persecution” is the main reason to become a refugee. The other parts of the definition are just placement in the world. People who create terror to people or different groups of people, like for example people who are from other religions or may be gay, people who believe something different in a country of settled beliefs have the reason to be afraid. And then to add hunger and poverty, people have another reason to leave whatever they had left.

The wide spread of people who want to do well are all thinking they would like to save the world. Although this is impossible, they have the chance to prove their words by helping in volunteer work in countries with refugees or countries that create refugees. To stop the “spread” one has to contain the source. 

The people actually doing something with this global issue are mostly non-governmental organizations, one cannot help hear about the Red Cross or other help services when a disaster strikes. In Norway we have the Norwegian Refugee Council Which provides assistance, protection and durable solutions to refugees, internally displaced persons, and returned worldwide.

What I mentioned about containing the source one has to make a better lifestyle in the country of origin. For example one can help out with food and shelter. Red Cross is great with this feature. But when people already have left their home country and need new help the organizations situated in different regions of the world are helping them with keeping them safe and providing food, shelter, health care and other vital parts of surviving.

This global issue is connected with almost anything we can think of. In a country where natural disasters strike, there are and will always be refugees. The same for where war strikes, the terror and use of global resources, the poverty that is spread across from nations to nations due to unemployment and bad school possibilities. There are also issues regarding health. This is all connected in one huge pile of sadness and bitterness, also known as global issues.

- John Ejnar

Sources:
- http://www.udi.no/Norwegian-Directorate-of-Immigration/News/2010/Who-comes-to-Norway-as-refugees-/
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_Refugee_Council
- http://www.refintl.org/get-involved/helpful-facts-%2526-figures
- http://www.geogonline.org.uk/as_g2ki1.42.htm

Health issues - Obesity

Our task about global issue is the health issues in the world, it´s a big theme and some examples is tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, malaria, polio, damages of radiation for example cancer, emotional problems and obesity. Obesity is what we are going to focus on in the rest of the task.  

Obesity is absolutely a global issue.  Obesity is when someone is so overweight that it is a threat to their health. This is increasing all over the world today, and there are not only people in rich countries that are obese. Obesity also varieties within every country, but is a problem on the entire planet. In 2005, approximately 1,6 billion people over 15 years old were overweight. WHO predict that by 2015, there will be approximately 2,3 billion overweight people. 

Male obesity: 2002, 2005, 2010           Female obesity: 2002, 2005, 2010

     

These pictures show that obesity is spread all over the world, but you also see which countries are most effected.

The causes of obesity are for example the society and the government. They make the unhealthy food with a lot of salt, sugar and fat, and this is cheaper than healthy food.  There are also more and more people that lose their self-confidence and eat to drown their sorrows. The food and self-confidence "combined with our increasingly sedentary lifestyles, increasing urbanization and changing modes of transportation, it is no wonder that obesity has rapidly increased in the last few decades, around the world." quote http://www.globalissues.org/article/558/obesity

Many countries have measures to prevent and help people who suffer of obesity.  There are many organizations and programs designed to help overweight people to lose weight and gain a healthier lives. Some stores in Norway have made fruit and healthy food cheaper, and that will hopefully make it easier for people to buy healthy food, instead of cheap and unhealthy food.  There is  also organizations for overweight people, so they can talk to other overweight people and make them understand that they are not alone. To talk with people who have lost weight and managed to get a healthy life can be a huge motivation for some.  The government, in a lot of countries, makes exercise a part of school, and that can be a huge help to prevent obesity among children. After-school activities is also a good way of preventing obesity among young people, so they can be social and active instead of sitting in front of the computer or TV and eating junk-food.

Obesity is especially common in USA, 30% of all obesity in the world is in America. People in the west part of the world suffer most of obesity, but it is becoming more and more common all over the world. But in the rich parts of the world they can afford to do something about it before people die of overweight, poor countries do not have the money to help them. Women is more affected than men, and science shoes that obesity is something that becomes more normal when one gets older. 

Obesity isn’t very connected to other global issues, but it is connected to poverty, but in some causes just avarice. Healthier products are more expensive, and to not spend that much money, they rather buy cheap products. The cheap products don’t include healthy ingredients, rather a lot of fat and sugar, since that’s easier to get hold of, and therefore cheaper to produce. 

The main problem “health issues” is on the other hand connected to more global issues. Poverty leads to people not being able to pay their water and electric bills, and the health decreases because of worse hygiene. Increasing population and urbanization lead to more diseases because of people living closer. This creates a larger and easier spread of different diseases and problems. Pollution makes the air unclean, and terrorism and wars help in the increasing of pollution because of vehicles and weapons. Wars make people’s health worse, mostly because of this, but also because of the conditions this leads to.  

Sources:

http://www.globalissues.org/article/558/obesity

Linda, Ragnhild S. og Åsne.