The
Social Good Summit kicked off a week of presentations on the SDG’s for civil society
while world leaders open the 72nd General Assembly. How can advances
in technology be combined with issues to accelerate achievement of the Sustainable
Development Goals? The Summit had over 100 young people in their Digital Media
Lounge tweeting, blogging, and posting on Facebook while great speakers gave
success stories, big picture dimensions, and many personal examples to make the
issues real. Some nuggets follow:
David Miliband, President and CEO of the
International Rescue Committee, sees a vacuum of leadership while half of
elementary school age refugee children are not in school and three quarters of high school age are not in school. Caryl Stern of UNICEF noted that there
are about 50 million refugee children. Uganda, for example, has 1.3 million
refugees, 240,000 in one refugee camp alone. David Beasley, Executive Director of the World Food Program, which
feeds 80 million people each day, noted that there are 155 million children
whose growth is stunted.
Lawrence
O’Donnell told of going to Malawi and learning that desks and chairs are
most needed. He worked with UNICEF and raised funds through
lastworddesks.msnbc.com. Desks and chairs are produced locally and allow students to no longer try to write
on a mud floor. When Lawrence’s daughter visited Malawi and learned that girls
do not attend high school as a rule because families struggle just to provide
the fee of about $80 for sons, she urged her dad to raise funds for girls
school fees. So far about $3 million has been raised empowering Malawi’s girls.
Lawrence choked up reading a poem of struggle and perseverance from one of
those students.
Bob Weir, founder of Grateful Dead, told of raising
money for rain forests 25 years ago. His work on the Sustainable Development
Goals is uplifting and fulfilling. Whoopi
Goldberg told of the early days in fighting off one more ism in the AIDS
crisis and her work with Elizabeth Taylor. She notes that if they can do it to
“them”—fill in the blank for race, gender, sexual preference, or religion—they
can do it to me. She points out that AIDs
education is still important today and she wishes people well with a lot of
sex, often.
Zia
Khan of the Rockefeller Foundation told of their work to provide light and
power, especially in India. While light is important, electric power opens the
door for much more efficient small businesses and provision of services. There
are about 1 billion on the plane without electricity. Rachel Kyte of Sustainable Energy4All
noted the important role of electric power is assuring cold chain
for keeping medicine effective as well as preserving food as it moves to the
market. Kate Hampton of the Children
Investment Fund Foundation urged ratification of the 2015 Kigali Amendment
to the Montreal Protocol. The Montreal Protocol addressed ozone while the
Kigali amendment addresses hydrofluorocarbons (HFC’s) used in air conditioning.
Implementation of this measure can reduce global warming by half a degree
centigrade.
Implementing
efficiency measures to save electric power and reducing hfc’s together would
reduce global warming by one degree centigrade.
John
Young of Pfizer Essential Health told of reducing both maternal and child mortality
through better child spacing with 6.5 million doses of a long lasting
contraceptive through a partnership that included the Gates Foundation. Ronald De Jong of the Phillips Foundation
told of their partnership with the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Telisa Yancy of American Family Insurance told of events in Seattle,
Minneapolis-St Paul, and Milwaukee to support the Susainable /development Goals
through Doing Good/#Dream Fearlessly. Rina
Kupferschmidt-Rojas of UBS spoke about impact investing.
The Social Good Summit was an object
lesson in using the power of social media and positivity to create a better
world!
