As electricity is becoming more and more expensive, why not embark on a power-saving scheme in 2013?

It’s cold outside, you’re staying in, putting on your heating, your TV and you head for long nice hot shower. How’s that going to look like on your power bill? You can do that without feeling guilty. Here’s how:

Step 1: Switch-off. An easy way to save power is to fully switch off anything which is plugged in and uses electricity. For your computer, printer – even your modem – it might come in handy to install a plug where you can do this all at once. Since you can only really be in one room at the time, switch of the lights in the others.

Step 2: Use with care. The washing machine uses a lot of electricity. Why not wash at 60 instead of 90 degrees, 40 instead of 60, 30 instead of 40? And forget about the dryer, why not dry your clothes the old-fashioned way? Other ways of using things more effectively are: turning up the temperature of the fridge, you don’t want to eat frozen yogurts anyway. Try also to turn down the brightness of your (TV, computer) screen, a couple of notches, you won’t even notice.

Step 3: Use some tools. The save energy in your home wiki speaks about the magic of insulating: “Up to a third of your home heating escapes through the roof. Prevent this by insulating. Not only is it simple to do, but it’s also the most cost efficient energy saving measure you can make. If you don’t already have it, invest in cavity-wall insulation. This will prevent another third of your heat escaping.” Solar panels can be a great investment too, especially to help you heat warm water.

Step 4: Replace. It makes sense to use energy-efficient appliances. However, it does not make sense to throw away things which are in perfect shape to replace them for others who loose less energy. If your concern about energy saving is based on idealist/moral grounds (we use too much energy in general and especially  fossil fuels, atomic energy etc.) and not just because of your wallet, then buying new stuff is definitely not the best way to save energy – producing a new low-consuming computer f. e. uses much more energy then what you can save with it. Things break. And when they do, that’s a good moment to consider buying a power-saving alternative. LED-lights for example live long and consume much less energy. For fridges and other kitchen-tools, there are energy standards.

Step 5: Reconsider. Do you know how your power is produced? Does it come from coal burning plants? From Atomic energy plants or maybe wind mills? There is only one way to know for sure: switch supplier. There are many options for renewable energy, some examples are ekotricity and Good Energy in the UK.

Picture courtesy by reway2007, thanks.

On Thursday 16th of November I got a chance to meet Aidil Fitr, Muslim Rasyid y Hariansyah Usman. The three environmental activists from Sumatra, Indonesia have been fighting for years against the paper industries in their home regions. Right now they are touring Europe – with the help of Greenpeace and the European Environmental Paper Network (EEPN) – to raise people’s awareness and at to find in them important allies to take on the big companies which destroy the Sumatran forests and fill the world with greenhouse gases with their plantations.

But first, let me give you some background information: Indonesia is the third highest ranked country – after China and the US – on the list of countries emitting greenhouse gases from deforestation. “In the last half-century about 74 million hectares of forest in Indonesia have been cut down, burned or degraded, an area equivalent to twice the size of Germany. In this region, illegal logging and corruption in the forestry industry is brutal”, Greenpeace explains.

That is why, in Barcelona, the activists from Indonesia together with Greenpeace and EEPN have come together with the graphic arts industry and the Publisher Guild. The Catalan capital is one of the places where APP (Asian Pulp&Paper) has the highest number of clients. “A large group of printing companies and packaging have been playing cat and mouse with Greenpeace in recent years. We know which ones are customers of Asia Pulp & Paper, but they deny, minimize or hide it”, said Miguel Angel Soto, head of the Spanish Greenpeace forests department.

Learn more in the following interview I did with Aidil Fiar, member of the Wahana Bumi Hijau NGO.

Why do you fight for the forests?

Aidil Fitri: I grew up in a small village in Sumatra and I remember that when I was a child, there were trees everywhere. The village was in the middle of the forest. When the paper industry arrived everything changed. Now there are no trees left. The three regions we are from are the ones most affected by deforestation. Besides, the paper industry causes so many bad things. Indigenous people who loose their livelihoods and species disappear…

We have been travelling a lot in Sumatra and we have met so many victims of this ruthless practise. These people had a good life, now the have nothing left. They used to live of the forest, now they do not know what to eat. The paper industry is also the root cause for many social conflicts in our country. People struggle to get their land back. To me there’s no doubt: I have to do something. We cannot say no to the paper industry, but we can try to change its practises.

What do you ask the paper industry to do?

Aidil Fitri: We don’t want to bankrupt these companies; after all, paper is an important opportunity for our country. What we want from them is that they stop expanding their territory by cutting down even more old trees. They should focus on sustainable plantation instead. In short: we just want them to be respectable, good companies.

How do the companies react to your work? Have you talked to them?

Aidil Fitri: We talked to them many times. It is always the same, they make a lot of empty promises on how they will improve the sustainability – nothing ever happens. All commitments for sustainability that APRIL and APP (editor’s note: the two big companies of the paper industry in Indonesia)  have made so far have been broken.

What is your opinion on civil disobedience?

Aidil Fitri: We have been thinking about using civil disobedience strategies. In some areas in Indonesia people have organized mass demonstrations and kept companies from harvesting their trees. However, so far none of these activities have led to any substantial change. Companies don’t stop expanding even if the government tells them to do so. What we have learned is that outsiders – people like you – can sometimes achieve more change. Companies need customers. That is why buyers have a lot of power: to choose the right products and force companies to endorse sustainable practises.

Do you think that the new technologies will bring relief to the forests?

Aidil Fitri: It is clear that we have to reduce our use of paper to safe the forests. These technologies can help us to achieve that. But we will still need paper. It is not our idea to tell people to stop using paper; we just want them to use sustainable paper. That is how we hope to fight the expansion of the paper industry in our home regions.

Civil society should focus on raising people’s awareness that the choice of paper is more than just an economic issue, it’s highly linked to the destruction of our environment and the livelihood of people in forest areas. Therefore, we should urge publishing houses and other companies to use sustainable paper and do the same in our own daily life. Just ask yourself: “do you know what kind of paper you are using?” According to the European Environmental Paper Network it is hard to name brands people should not buy because brands and name change easily. It’s easier to know what to look out for. First of all, you should buy recycled paper which is totally free of chlorine – there is a difference between a chlorine free process and a chlorine free product. Blue Angel and FSC are good, sustainable brands which keep high controls of their products. Generally, the more you can reduce your paper use, the better: that’s good for the environment and your wallet.

This interview has also been published on barcelonaconsensus.org.

There’s nothing good about rising xenophobia (i. e. Golden Dawn in Greece) and public health care being suddenly only for some of the citizens. The crisis has many ugly faces. But the crisis is also a chance, an awakening to the true nature of the capitalist neoliberal system. A look at some of the emerging alternatives in Spain:

Alternatives to the system

Although cooperatives had always existed in Spain, especially in the agricultural sector, they are now being rediscovered. Mondragon, the Basque Town-Cooperative who is believed to be the world’s biggest aggregate of work-cooperatives shows a real alternative to the crisis. The Director-General of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Juan Somavia recently stated: “Guided by the compass of social justice, cooperatives are vehicles for promoting decent work and decent lives for all. As democratic, value-driven and locally-controlled organizations, they foster social inclusion”.

Social movements

Even before Occupy started in the US, people in Spain were on the streets. The movement took the name of M15 due to the first day of mass-demonstration May 15^th 2011. The youth-led movement also referred to as “indignados” (the indignant) questioned everything long-established with its calls repeated over and over again in demonstrations “You do not represent us” – referred at the political system, “No hay pan para tanto chorizo.” (“There’s not enough bread for so much sausage” – chorizo being also a word for thiefs) – referring to the corruption, “to those who are watching, this also affects you” – leaving no doubt that things will get worse and no one is safe. The movement definitely played its role in showing how this crisis is different- it is systemic.

Other movements like PAH (Platform for Mortgage Victims) are slowly changing realities. Their fight for a more humane treatment of banks towards the people in debt is eventually changing public perception. That is in dire need, 350,000 evictions in the past four years, have brought many families to the street and into misery. PAH is currently collecting signatures for a reform of the housing-politics.

Alternatives to the financial economy

The role banks play in the down spiral of the capitalist economy only really unraveled over the last years. Recapitalizing the banks (through the European Stability Mechanism etc.) really only postpones the structural problem this institution holds. It remains a mystery to the people how banks can get money again and again while for everything else there is no money left. Nowhere else in Europe social banks grow as fast as in Spain. Time banks are also pop up all over the country.

On October 26 and 27 the region of Catalonia inaugurated its first region social currency “ECOSOL” (standing for social /solidarity economy). During the first weekend, the Catalonian Solidarity Economy Fare, 17’000 Ecosols were issued and used.

“The old is dying and yet the new cannot be born”, Gramsci’s words describe well how the world latches onto the obsolete neoliberal system. Here in Spain, however, the new is already here.

Picture Courtesy by Ramon Fornell, grácies!

History is like maths. Things which already happend and which are therefore easy to tell. But that depends on who’s telling it.

In reality, history is a very biased area of teaching and especially a very biased way of thinking. “History is not just what-really-happened-in-the-past, but a complex intersection of truths, bias and hopes.”  It lies in the nature of history that some things are forgotten and others are added on purpose. In a book dedicated to the topic, the author, James W. Loewen, writes:  “the teaching of history, more than any other discipline, is dominated by textbooks… the books are boring… [they] exclude conflict or real suspense. They leave out anything that might reflect badly upon our national character” Here are some projects aimed at getting things right:

She-story:

If we look through our history books it seems as if “our society in general was the society of MEN”. However, some women did not let themselves be reduced to cooking and educating the children, they actually made history. The project She-Story wants to “make visible some extraordinary women that contributed the development of the society of the Mediterranean with their work and life, but didn’t gain enough attention and recognition in the past.”

Historiana

History has always meant “national” history. A way of telling the past in which the own national is the (mostly heroic) centre of the world. A new project based in Holland is now offering history teachers a tool to teach their subjects with different points of view. Historiana “provides content that is inclusive for all people, regardless of their cultural, religious or ethnic background. Alternative themes and topics such as Human Rights, Migration and the Environment, are integrated alongside traditional ones such as the World Wars and the Industrial Revolution.” Generally, Historiana offers a new way of approaching history education, an approach which is “learner centered, and promote key competences, such as critical thinking and multiperspectivity”.

Zinn Education Project: Teaching a people’s history

For the US, you can find a enriching list of projects on how to teach history with a more critical view here. The Zinn Project’s “goal is to introduce students to a more accurate, complex, and engaging understanding of United States history than is found in traditional textbooks and curricula. The empowering potential of studying U.S. history is often lost in a textbook-driven trivial pursuit of names and dates.” Here’s also a video worth watching. It focuses on Mexican American Studies and the right to tell your own history.

Finally, to get back to Columbus, just think about him for a second and what they told you about his adventures in school. Now, read these lines taken from Lies my teacher told me:

• “Columbus claimed everything he saw right off the boat. When textbooks celebrate this process, they imply that taking the land and dominating the indians was inevitable if not natural” (44).
• Most important, [Columbus's] prupose from the beginning was not mere exploration or even trade, but conquest and exploitation, for which he used religion as a rationale. If textbooks included these facts, they might induce students to think intelligently about why the West dominates the world today” (45).
•  ”Christopher Columbus introduced two phenomena that revolutionized race relations and transformed the modern world: the taking of land, wealth, and labor from indigenous peoples, leading to their near extermination, and the transatlantic slave trade, which created a racial underclass” (60).
• Columbus’ story really is “.. one of the primary instances of genocide in all human history” (64).
• “Columbus is not a hero in Mexico… Why not? Because Mexico is also much more Indian than the United States, and Mexicans perceive Columbus as white and European. “No sensible Indian person,” wrote George P. Horse Capture, “can celebrate the arrival of Columbus.” Cherishing Columbus is a characteristic of white history, not American history” (70).
•  ”The worshipful biographical vignettes of Columbus in our textbooks serve to indoctrinate students into a mindless endorsement of colonialism… the Columbus myth allows us to accept the contemporary division of the world into developed and underdeveloped spheres as natural and given, rather than a historical product issuing from a process that began with Columbus’s first voyage” (70).

So what alternative is there? The Rethinking Columbus Project says: “Why rethink Christopher Columbus? Because the Columbus myth is a foundation of children’s beliefs about society. Columbus is often a child’s first lesson about encounters between different cultures and races. The murky legend of a brave adventurer tells children whose version of history to accept, and whose to ignore. It says nothing about the brutality of the European invasion of North America.”

Rewriting the truth about colonialism is a big task but first steps are being taken.

On September 27 and 28 the 2. European Congress on Global Education took place in Lisbon: Education, Interdependence & Solidarity in a Changing World.

In 2002, at the first congress Global Education had been defined as “Education that opens people’s eyes and minds to the realities of the world, and awakens them to bring about a world of greater justice, equity and human rights for all.” The Maastricht Declaration further stated that Globale Education is an encompassing term for Development Education, Human Rights Education, Education for Sustainability, Peace Education etc.

The event was organized by the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe, the Global Education Network Europe (GENE) and the European NGO Confederation for Relief and Development (CONCORD). The congress brought together different stakeholders: civil society, educators, academia, local and regional authorities as well as governments and parliamentarians which meant a rather diverse set of knowledge about global education and expectations towards the event.

According to a civil-society group (including myself), the program, which focused on creating recommendations for curricular reforms, capacity-building, quality support, campaigning and the creation of national strategies, omitted an important point: the current crisis. Especially participants from Southern European countries were asking for a bold stand of Global Education towards the crisis remembering the transformative nature which is inherent to GE. Similarly, in a recent dossier published by Concord and DEEEP, Stephen McCloskey from the Centre for Global Education in Ireland writes: “the question for development educators raised by the global recession is what contribution can we make toward creating a more sustainable model of development and economic growth? As a form of education driven by social justice and equality, development education should be at the heart of this debate so, how should we respond to the financial crisis?” Global Education should therefore take up an active role in offering alternatives and tools for a better future empowering youth and other lesser heard voices to transform their realities. Recommendations have been made for the drafting committee of the Lisbon Declaration which will be published in the coming months.

Challenges are big not only for Europe but also for Global Education. As in many countries (Spain, Italy and Greece but also the UK …) the funding opportunities for GE dissapear at a incredible speed, there is the need to reinvent the this transformative and participatory education framework. As poverty, unemployment as well as civil unrest and extreme right politics are on the rise on the continent and public spending on education is one of the biggest victim of the austerity politics, it is time to take Global Education to the local level: promote alternatives to the system, promote solidarity and empower youth to see beyond the neoliberal, capitalist worldview should become complementary aspects of GE besides its focus on global inequalities and human rights. Now more than ever, we should realize that we can learn from the South – especially on the impact of debt.

I strongly believe that education can indeed be a tool to foster change. In accordance with McCloskey it can be said that “we need to de-mystify markets and prioritise developmental needs over the financial sector rather than capital dictating the terms of human development.” On the last, unofficial, day of the conference, some participants joined the anti-troika protests in the centre of Lisbon.

Vandana Shiva and her organization Global Alliance for Seed Freedom are starting a global initiative for the freedom of peasants to keep their seeds. The event will take place contemporarily and in coordination with Jan Satyagraha starting on October 2^nd (Gandhi’s Birth Anniversary) and ending on October 16^th (World Food Day). These two weeks will see activities world-wide to raise awareness on the issue of Seed Freedom.

Currently, mainly countries in the world have laws which prohibit peasants to keep seeds since big companies like Monsanto hold the patents rights of the seeds. Biopiracy and seed monopolies are driving peasants into poverty around the world and especially in India. The spread of GMO seeds and its accompanying fertilizers are a huge thread to the environment. Gandhi had said, “as long as the superstition that unjust laws must be obeyed exist, so will slavery exist”. If you are planning an activity during the Action Fortnight, contact the Global Alliance for Seed Freedom so that your activity can be included in the global calendar.

The Action fortnight starts with the worldwide launch of the Global Citizen’s report on Seed Freedom which has been elaborated jointly by over 100 groups, organizations and networks. Furthermore, the civil disobedience activities around the world include seed swaps, protest marches and the declaration of Seed Freedom Zones. Here are some activities which will take place:

• Oct 2nd – Protest Demonstration for Seed Freedom in Delhi.
• Oct 2nd- London Freedom Seed Bank Open Meeting by Food from the Sky, London, UK.
• October 8th – Launch of Global Seed Report and Campaign in Mallorca, Spain
• Oct 11th – Screening of film on Seeds and Seed Multinationals by Colabora with a talk by Vandana Shiva in Stuttgart, Germany.
• Oct 16th – Vasundhara – A national gathering of seed keepers and organic farmer to celebrate 25 years of seed freedom and food freedom and plan actions for the next 25 years in Dehradun, India

The first step to participate in the action is to join the Alliance for Seed Freedom by signing the declaration. Together with the Alliance we at Barcelona Consensus say: “We commit ourselves to defending seed freedom as the freedom of diverse species to evolve; as the freedom of human communities to reclaim open source seed as a commons.”

Watch Vandana Shiva explain her initiative:

Picture courtesy of blurdom, merci.

The call it the “biggest company you never heard of.” But soon you will hear about it because its becoming even bigger. Next month we will hear about a impressive merger in the business world: the one of Anglo-Swiss multinational mining company Xstrata and the Swiss multinational commodity trading and mining company Glencore. Glencore is by the way already the world’s largest commodities trading company with a share of 60% in zinc market and 50% share of the copper market. They are further highly involved in grain and oil trading. Xstrata is the world’s largest producer of ferrochrome. In short: these two companies are already HUGE by themselves. Now, they might become one. Which gives them … more money and more control.

As Foreign Policy writes: “Already the world’s biggest middleman, (Glencore) now wants to control the entire business chain, from mines and smelters to storage facilities for finished products, and from pumping oil to shipping it to refineries, while trading and hedging all along the way, industry experts say.”

What is interesting is that both companies have an incredible record of human rights violations. Right now, more and more people in Latinamerica protest against the mining companies and most of these protests are directed at one of the two giants we are talking about today. In the Dominican Republic, Argentina and Peru people protest against Xstrata and in Colombia mine workers strike against the conduct of Glencore.

In May, for example, two people were killed and 50 injured in protests against the Xstrata copper mine Tintaya in Peru. The government suspended the freedom of assembly. The protesters say that the mining causes terrible environmental pollution and that the region is not benefitting enough from what is estracted from their land.

Glencore, on the other hand is buying minerals from children. Kids as young as ten in teh Democractic Republic of Congo climb down small mines to search for cobalt and copper. Obviously, they are not at all protected.

In Bolivia, Glencore is no longer welcome. Their mines have been repeatedly seized by the government.

Here is what the people of Public Eye wrote about Glencore when it won the Public Eye Award in 2008: “Glencore is quite literally impenetrable, not just because of the coal dust rising from its mines in Colombia but also because it is very secretive about its business practices. … Glencore has no scruples when it comes to mining raw materials. Colombia is the best example. Here, Glencore’s coalmines are causing massive pollution that represents a serious health hazard for the local population. True to form, the commodities multinational is very anti-union and fires workers when they try to organize themselves.”

People in Switzerland at the same time feel ashamed of these Swiss-based companies and feel for the people in the affected regions. That is why the protests have also reached the small European country. Tages Anzeiger, one of the most-read newspapers in Switzerland titled in July: “Glencore and Xstrata are becoming a risk for the reputation of Switzerland“. The local group “Solidarity with the victims of comodity trading multinationals” criticize that these companies infringe human and social rights, pollute the environment and increase the global distance between poor and rich. More and more initiatives in Switzerland are emerging which try to control the companies which are based in the country.

The next World Economic Forum is coming up and so it is time to start thinking about Public Eye Award Nominations.

Last year Barclays, Samsung and Freeport McMoran sweared they are good and not harming anyone. Barclays – betting on food and therefore making people starve all over the planet – was not convincing enough and won the Jury award for the most harmful company in 2011. Vale – the company building dams in the Amazon – was awarded by the public for the second award for its bad environmental impact. Over 88’000 people had voted.

Now, the Public Eye Award will also be given to a bad company this year. Until the 15th of September you can nominate whatever corporation you want on the official page.  The organizers – Berne Declaration and Greenpeace Switzerland – write: “the organization that nominates the winner of the Jury Award will be invited to join us in Davos in late January, to present its case at our international press conference.” Unfortunately, it is still quite easy to think about bad companies which are worth nominating. What are your ideas?

I will keep you posted about the nominations and the awards.

That’s more or less what the Barcelona Consensus is trying to create calling it a world livable for all. The basic document of the Consensus called Declaration 1.0 starts with the very true words: “The current global situation is unacceptable: it is structurally violent, unjust and unsustainable. We are living through one of the most decisive periods in the history of humankind, both in terms of gravity and scope. A crisis of consciousness and responsibility underlies our current predicament. Most current leaders have shown neither the ability nor the willingness to radically renew the existing economic or decision-making structures. Nor have they adopted the values needed to drive a transformation.”

Now, how is the Consensus trying to change that? It offers itself as an alternative to the Washington Consensus a place very a few people in the North decide for the whole world. On the contrary, the Barcelona Consensus has been elaborated by a large group of people from all over the planet – with high attention to gender- and georegional balance.

The main ideas for change of the Barcelona Consensus are to include everyone in the change towards a world livable for all: by signing the Barcelona Consensus Commitment one can be part of a movement towards:

• A participatory and deliberative democracy
• Environmental sustainability
• A social, equitable and sustainable economy
• A non-speculative financial system
• A society of shared knowledge and democratic communication
• A world beyond war and violence
• A democratic world governance

People around the planet are starting to organize in so-called transition circles where they work on one or more of the above goals on a local scale – if change doesn’t come from above, it must come from below. Furthermore, Barcelona Consensus guides the shared work on an ACT! (Action for a Common Transformation), one activity carried out around the planet by different NGOs, social movements and organisations to move closer to that world we want. This year’s ACT! is Jan Satyagraha – the largest non-violent march the world has ever seen.

Join Barcelona Consensus on their homepage: Barcelonaconsensus.org.

Watch this video from the World Social Forum in Dakar to learn more: