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POVERTY AND THE PLANET

What is striking about the big picture of the world environmental situation is the growing contrast between the so-called "developed" world and the so-called "developing" world.  The gap between the richest 20% and poorest 20% of the world is at its highest level in history and growing. Since 1960 it has widened from 30-to-1 to 80-to-1.  The articles below will highlight more information on the severe poverty we face today.


Growth of the World's Slums (World Future Fund Chart)

There are 85 People Who Are As Wealthy As Half the WORLD (Huffington Post, 1-21-14)

Crisis Squeezes Income and Puts Pressure on Inequality and Poverty (OECD Report, 2013)
The gap between the rich and the poor in OECD countries has increased more between 2007-2010, than in the previous 12 years.


People and the Planet Report (The Royal Society, 4-25-12)
Rapid and widespread changes to the world's population are coming. These changes will be accompanied by unprecedented levels of consumption, profound challenges to human health and the natural environment. This report is an all inclusive discussion that offers some interesting suggestions to the problems our world faces today. The key recommendations of this report involve: bringing the 1.3 billion people living on less than $1.25 per day out of poverty, stabilizing emerging economies and reducing material consumption, improving reproductive health world wide and tackling the problems of pollution in the developing world.


Poverty Facts and Stats (Global Issues)
This site includes many detailed and informative statistics about the state of world poverty. One particularly horrific fact is that at least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 a day. Almost half of the world - over 3 billion people - live on less than $2.50 a day. This trend of income inequality is also continuing to grow.


The World Bank's Poverty and Inequality Database
A great site for generating statistics on poverty for 173 different countries around the world.


Richest 2% hold half the world's assets (Financial Times, 12-6-06)
Distribution on personal wealth is spread unevenly across the world.  This article explains how the richest being two per cent of adults own more than 50 per cent of the world's assets while the poorest half share only one per cent of wealth.  Click here to read the Press Release text.  (World Institute for Development Economic Research)

 

CORPORATE GREED AND THE WORLD

The lies behind this transatlantic trade deal (The Guardian, 12-2-13) There are plans to create an EU-US single market that will allow corporations to sue governments using selective panels, and to bypass courts and parliaments.