The UN Food Systems Summit was set out to review food systems to see if they ensure that the goal well defined by the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, is achieved: “Build a world in which healthy and nutritious food is available and affordable for everyone, everywhere. But this should not be at the expense…
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On August 23, 2021, at the Tacagua’ camp of Challapata, Oruro (Bolivia), thanks to the support of the CASA Collective, about 150 members of the communities that make up the National Network of Women in Defense of Mother Earth gathered. The concern was the threat of mining companies in their attempt to explore in order…
Read moreAdvocacy is also defense when it acts to preserve the initial aims and values of modern discoveries. According to legend, when Vladimir Lenin was asked how he planned to “hang all the capitalists” in the face of a rope shortage in the young Soviet Union, he replied “don’t worry comrade; the capitalists will sell us…
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Advocacy is both defending people, especially the poor and vulnerable ones, and actions promoting values. Splitting the two, people and values, however, brings advocacy to a cleft stick of becoming a tricky ideological issue. Insofar, a clear set of values on the background of any advocacy is of acute need. Two significant examples are on…
Read moreAdvocacy is concerned with values, awareness and knowledge of problems to promote actions, policies and changes in the issues that interest people. Advocacy does not always aim, right from the start, at concrete results. Sometimes the right or desire of a person or a group involves too many values and too many instances to offer…
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Since April 2020, the European Commission has defined the EU strategy to support the fight against COVID-19 globally through an action plan called Team Europe, which combines and coordinates resources from the EU, its Member countries, the European Investment Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and other EU financial institutions, in synergy with…
Read moreMother’s Day for the year 2021 is celebrated on Sunday, May 9th. It is a time to honor mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers for their contribution to family and society. What about those mothers who are the primary providers for the majority of the world’s 925 million hungry people? Women produce 60 to 80 per cent of all food, both…
Read moreClimate change is disrupting our world and the temperature has risen one degree centigrade and it will not go back. We have reached a point of no return and that is a security risk to the planet and to every nation. We can stop it rising higher. One of the grave security risks is the…
Read moreIn the Autumn of 2011, the Occupy movement was growing like a weed – quickly and strongly. In groups as small as two and as large as 200,000, people gathered in public spaces around the world to challenge an economic system that has long abandoned the majority for the profit of a few, creating what…
Read moreIn preparation for the 2021 Financing for Development Forum at the United Nations (UN), the NGO Committee on FfD, a substantive committee of CoNGO (Conference of NGOs) held a virtual working breakfast briefing and interactive discussion on January 15 with the Concept Note The Recovery We Want: For People and Planet. Since 2018, the Committee…
Read moreInternational organisms during this pandemic are under scrutiny and surely for many and good reasons. However, even in the weed fields some good wheat can be harvest. The United Nations has provided many juridical tools and agreements among its member States that support a claim for social justice. The IMF (International Monetary Fund), for its…
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Advocacy is a process to ensure change where there is injustice, providing a solution to a problem, and building support for acting on both the problem and the solution. Its aims, among others, are social changes in attitudes and relationships. However, advocating for the poor is far from lobbying for an ideology. This clear divergence…
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When asked how a farmer’s daughter who became a Catholic nun ended up as one of Brazil’s most influential refugee advocates, Sister Rosita Milesi, 79,…
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Vusi was an honest man and a hard worker. He had cleared a large piece of moorland and turned it into a beautiful fertile field. He…
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On 24 November, the Solemnity of Christ the King, on the occasion of World Youth Day in the Particular Churches, in St. Peter's Basilica the traditional…
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