[Marxism] "Let’s respect our Mother Earth" Letter from Evo to the UN

["Fred Fuentes" <fred.fuentes@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Let's respect our Mother Earth"

http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2007/09/lets-respect-our-mother-earth.html

Letter from President Evo Morales to the member representatives of the
United Nations on the issue of the environment.

Sister and brother Presidents and Heads of States of the United
Nations: The world is suffering from a fever due to climate change,
and the disease is the capitalist development model. Whilst over
10,000 years the variation in carbon dioxide (CO2) levels on the
planet was approximately 10%, during the last 200 years of industrial
development, carbon emissions have increased by 30%. Since 1860,
Europe and North America have contributed 70% of the emissions of CO2.
2005 was the hottest year in the last one thousand years on this
planet.

Different investigations have demonstrated that out of the 40,170
living species that have been studied, 16,119 are in danger of
extinction. One out of eight birds could disappear forever. One out of
four mammals is under threat. One out of every three reptiles could
cease to exist. Eight out of ten crustaceans and three out of four
insects are at risk of extinction. We are living through the sixth
crisis of the extinction of living species in the history of the
planet and, on this occasion, the rate of extinction is 100 times more
accelerated than in geological times.

Faced with this bleak future, transnational interests are proposing to
continue as before, and paint the machine green, which is to say,
continue with growth and irrational consumerism and inequality,
generating more and more profits, without realising that we are
currently consuming in one year what the planet produces in one year
and three months. Faced with this reality, the solution can not be an
environmental make over.

I read in the World Bank report that in order to mitigate the impacts
of climate change we need to end subsidies on hydrocarbons, put a
price on water and promote private investment in the clean energy
sector. Once again they want to apply market recipes and privatisation
in order to carry out business as usual, and with it, the same
illnesses that these policies produce. The same occurs in the case of
biofuels, given that to produce one litre of ethanol you require 12
litres of water. In the same way, to process one ton of agrifuels you
need, on average, one hectare of land.

Faced with this situation, we – the indigenous peoples and humble and
honest inhabitants of this planet – believe that the time has come to
put a stop to this, in order to rediscover our roots, with respect for
Mother Earth; with the Pachamama as we call it in the Andes. Today,
the indigenous peoples of Latin America and the world have been called
upon by history to convert ourselves into the vanguard of the struggle
to defend nature and life.

I am convinced that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples, recently approved after so many years of struggle,
needs to pass from paper to reality so that our knowledge and our
participation can help to construct a new future of hope for all. Who
else but the indigenous people, can point out the path for humanity in
order to preserve nature, natural resources and the territories that
we have inhabited from ancient times.

We need a profound change of direction, at the world wide level, so as
to stop being the condemned of the earth. The countries of the north
need to reduce their carbon emissions by between 60% and 80% if we
want to avoid a temperature rise of more than 2º in what is left of
this century, which would provoke global warming of catastrophic
proportions for life and nature.

We need to create a World Environment Organisation which is binding,
and which can discipline the World Trade Organisation, which is
propelling as towards barbarism. We can no longer continue to talk of
growth in Gross National Product without taking into consideration the
destruction and wastage of natural resources. We need to adopt an
indicator that allows us to consider, in a combined way, the Human
Development Index and the Ecological Footprint in order to measure our
environmental situation.

We need to apply harsh taxes on the super concentration of wealth, and
adopt effective mechanisms for its equitable redistribution. It is not
possible that three families can have an income superior to the
combined GDP of the 48 poorest countries. We can not talk of equity
and social justice whilst this situation continues.

The United States and Europe consume, on average, 8.4 times more that
the world average. It is necessary for them to reduce their level of
consumption and recognise that all of us are guests on this same land;
of the same Pachamama.

I know that change is not easy when an extremely powerful sector has
to renounce their extraordinary profits for the planet to survive. In
my own country I suffer, with my head held high, this permanent
sabotage because we are ending privileges so that everyone can "Live
Well" and not better than our counterparts. I know that change in the
world is much more difficult than in my country, but I have absolute
confidence in human beings, in their capacity to reason, to learn from
mistakes, to recuperate their roots, and to change in order to forge a
just, diverse, inclusive, equilibrated world in harmony with nature

Evo Morales Ayma
President of the Republic de Bolivia
September 24, 2007

Translated by Federico Fuentes for Bolivia Rising,
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/

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