What's going on in the world?
Syria
The Never-Ending Conflict
What started as a group of children spreading politically motivated graffiti has snowballed into one of the world’s most harrowing and unstoppable conflicts to date.
According to the United Nations, more than 400,000 lives have been lost since civil unrest first broke in 2011. To add to these figures, it’s reported at least 6.3 million people are displaced within the war-stricken nation, including the lives of innocent children, pregnant women, the sick and the elderly.
Countries including Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and Egypt have opened their borders to the people of Syria, with at least 5.2 million individuals reported as refugees [UNHCR]. Australia, the United Kingdom, Germany and other western countries have also provided a level of support. However, for citizens and families left within Syria, every day continues to be a fight for survival. Air strikes and battlegrounds all but too much of a regular occurrence, with no end in sight.
Want to learn more about Syria’s civil unrest? Read ‘A Lost Generation’ via Rarlo Online.
Yemen
What You Need To Know
You have probably heard something about it in the news, but what do you really know about Yemen’s famine crisis?
Although Yemen has been vulnerable for years, since conflict begun between government and non-government forces in 2014, the nation has experienced one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters. The result: millions of people have been forced homeless, displaced and injured, without any means to basic sanitation, supplies and medical assistance. Outbreaks of life-threatening diseases including cholera are rising by the minute, with at least 540,000 suspected cases reported, and more than 2,000 associated deaths in the last two years alone [OCHA].
According to the United Nations, 19 million individuals—almost 70% of the country’s population—are facing a life-or-death situation every single day. And, if not quickly provided with humanitarian aid, clean water, food and medicine, the death toll will only continue to rise.
Myanmar
Who Is Rohingya?
Every day we are waking up to a more gruesome, more harrowing story about Rohingya. The question is, who makes up this ethic minority, and why do they fear their lives?
Descendants of muslim migrants from India and China, the Rohingya has been known to live in the predominantly buddhist state of Myanmar (also known as Burma) since the 12th century. Although some would say the ethic minority has never been treated equally, since the 1970s Rohingya has been at the centre of numerous violent attacks, instigated by native buddhists and Myanmar security forces. These actions have led the United Nations, among many other international human rights organisations, to describe Rohingya as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world.
Over the last 40 years, the Myanmar government has stripped Rohingya of their citizenship, homes, voting rights and basic freedom, not to mention a dire lack of health care and fundamental sanitation.
Learn more about the Rohingya crisis via the online addition of Rarlo Magazine.
Global Pollution
The World’s Biggest Killer
The average human takes 16 breaths per minute, 960 breaths an hour and 23,040 breaths a day. So, what if you knew the air we are breathing could prematurely end your life?
In a breakthrough, global analysis [The Lancet Commission on Pollution and Health] scientists have named global pollution as the world's biggest killer, with more than nine million people dying in 2015 as a result. To put that into perspective, that figure is the same as 16% of all annual recorded deaths. The study suggested toxic air, water, soil and workplaces are among some of the most worrying finds, and should be held collectively accountable for diseases that kill 1-in-6 people in the world. The authors of the report suggested “pollution endangers the stability of the Earth’s support systems and threatens the continuing survival of human societies.”
In 2016, the World Health Organisation [WHO] released a new report that found “98% of cities in low and middle-income countries, with more than 100,000 inhabitants, do not meet WHO air quality guidelines”.
Read more about this alarming environmental issue in the next addition of Rarlo Magazine.
The Amazon
Day-By-Day Destruction
The Amazon rainforest is the planet’s largest ecosystem, home to thousands upon thousands of plants, bird species, fish, mammals and insects—not to mention more than 400 indigenous tribes.
Also referred to as the lungs of Earth, the Amazon produces more than 20% of the world’s oxygen—however this is all about to rapidly change, thanks to that little word ‘deforestation’. Since 1970, when the Brazilian government first began chopping down the ecosystem in trade for roads, more than 20% of the Amazon rainforest has been eradicated. Most of this land has been destructed to make way for mass agricultural plantations, including the production of soy and cattle farming.
Although deemed illegal, the logging trade plays a huge part in the destruction of the rainforest, with company’s such as Agropecuaria Santa Efigenia Ltd earning more than $7 million a year from illegal timber [Greenpeace International]. Of course, the Brazilian government has committed to ‘zero illegal deforestation’ by 2030—the question is, will it be too late?
The War
On Plastic Waste
Good news Queenslanders—the government has officially banned the bag.
Coming into effect mid 2018, this new law will see supermarket giants, including Coles and Woolworths, embracing reusable alternatives, rather than the traditional single-use carriers. New South Wales is the only Australian state that is yet to ban the bag, with Victoria being the most recent game changer.
Nationally, an estimated five billon plastic bags are handed out every year, with more than one trillion used worldwide. According to Clean Up Australia, Australians are the world’s second biggest producers of waste. In fact, it’s estimated that we individually send more than 690 kilograms of rubbish to landfill every year. To find out more about the world’s war on plastic, flick over to A Plastic Pandemic.