Sustainable September
“Show off your sustainability for a change”, says Robyn Williams, Co-Convenor of Sustainable September, an annual celebration of sustainability in Western Australia.
“People in community, business, government, industry and education are showing off activities that are creating a sustainable future, airing the issues, planning the future and celebrating achievements.”
Sustainable September is a communication campaign which demonstrates environmental responsibility and social justice in action, and how this contributes to economic prosperity. Importantly it celebrates the work of the many individuals and groups who are putting sustainability into practice in WA. More than 80 opportunities to experience sustainability in action fill the Calendar of Events on: www.sustainableseptember.net.au
“Given the fast looming reality of climate change and the current global financial cirsis, we are highlighting the need to accelerate sustainability thinking and decision making in government, business and community.”
This year the Sustainable September organisers initiated a research project with the Australian Institute of Management and the WA Council of Social Service. The project started with a survey of AIMWA and WACOSS members to scope the level of corporate social responsibility and sustainability across organisations in WA. Results will be presented at a features SS09 event, a sundowner at AIMWA on 22nd September, along with practical advice on improving business performance.
SS09 alliances include the four universities in Perth, the local government sector, Government agencies and the private sector, ensuring that a wide range of sustainability related work being undertaken in this State can be demonstrated.
“It is time that we developed a blueprint for a sustainable future for this State that incorporates the consideration of social, environmental and economical aspects of issues, and has a very long-term time horizon rather than the usual focus on the current financial year or the next election”, Ms Williams concluded, “The climate is right for sustainability, so be a show-off!”
Sustainable September was first co-convened by Ms Williams from POV Communication and the WA Collaboration for Sustainability in 2003. The seventh month long communication campaign is guided by a Steering Committee represented by the WA Council of Churches, the WA Council of Social Service, the Conservation Council of WA, Unions WA, the Ethnic Communities Council of WA and POV Communication for Sustainability.
Events and Key Announcements are posted on the Sustainable September website.
World Council of Churches Statement on Eco-Justice and Ecological Debt
The World Council of Churches (WCC) Central Committee adopted a “Statement on eco-justice and ecological debt” on Wednesday, 2 Sept. The statement proposes that Christians have a deep moral obligation to promote ecological justice by addressing our debts to peoples most affected by ecological destruction and to the earth itself. The statement addresses ecological debt and includes hard economic calculations as well as biblical, spiritual, cultural and social dimensions of indebtedness.
The statement identifies the current unprecedented ecological crises as being created by humans, caused especially by the agro-industrial-economic complex and the culture of the North, characterized by the consumerist lifestyle and the view of development as commensurate with exploitation of the earth’s so-called “natural resources”. Churches are being called upon to oppose with their prophetic voices such labeling of the holy creation as mere “natural resources”.
The statement points out that it is a debt owed primarily by industrialized countries in the North to countries of the South on account of historical and current resource-plundering, environmental degradation and the dumping of greenhouse gases and toxic wastes.
In its call for action the statement urges WCC member churches to intervene with their governments to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to adopt a fair and binding deal at the UN climate conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.
Additionally the statement calls upon the international community to ensure the transfer of financial resources to countries of the south to refrain from oil drilling in fragile environments. Further on, the statement demands the cancellation of the illegitimate financial debts of the southern countries, especially for the poorest nations as part of social and ecological compensation.
In a 31 August hearing on “ecological debt” during the WCC Central Committee meeting in Geneva, Dr Maria Sumire Conde from the Quechua community of Peru shared some ways that the global South has been victimized by greed und unfair use of its resources. In the case of Peru, Sumire said mining has had particularly devastating effects, such as relocation, illness, polluted water,and decreasing biodiversity.
The concept of ecological debt has been shaped to measure the real cost that policies of expansion and globalization have had on developing nations, a debt that some say industrialized nations should repay. Dr Joan Martinez Alier, a professor at the Universidad Autònoma de Barcelona in Spain, said climate change, unequal trade, “bio-piracy”, exports of toxic waste and other factors have added to the imbalance, which he called “a kind of war against people around the world, a kind of aggression.”
Martinez went on saying: “I know these are strong words, but this is true.” He beseeched those present, at the very least not to increase the existing ecological debt any further.
The WCC president from Latin America, Rev. Dr Ofelia Ortega of Cuba, said ecological debt was a spiritual issue, not just a moral one. “The Bible is an ecological treatise” from beginning to end, Ortega said. She described care for creation as an “axis” that runs through the word of God. “Our pastoral work in our churches must be radically ecological,” she said.
More on the 31 August hearing on ecological debt
WCC countdown to climate justice
WCC programme work on poverty, wealth and ecology
More information on the 26 August – 2 September 2009 Central Committee meeting
Additional information: Juan Michel,+41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org
The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith, witness and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical fellowship of churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings together 349 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million Christians in over 110 countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman Catholic Church. The WCC general secretary is Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia, from the Methodist Church in Kenya. Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.
