A first word on spoken words and words to follow
Ten years ago, the Green Network of Sri Lanka wrote a
comprehensive status report of the country in terms of sustainability, titled
‘Bitter truths and better tomorrows: People’s report on sustainable
development’. The preamble to the
document contained the following lines:
‘The ancients say that
in the ideal interaction with the natural world the human being should follow
the example of the bee: obtaining the nectar of the flower without harming
either the colour or the fragrance, while at the same time ensuring the
survival of genetic strains by facilitating cross-pollination.’
Why cannot the human being be like the bee? That was the question that was asked,
followed by the observation, ‘instead of striving to fulfill one’s basic needs,
the human being relentlessly pursues the satisfaction of greed, competing
violently with his fellow creatures and in the process brining the entire earth
to the brink of irreversible disaster’.
We’ve come from Rio to Rio through Johannesburg. We came from the Rio Declaration and Agenda
21 to the Johannesburg Declaration and a ‘Plan of Implementation’. We’ve come from Green to Black and in the
name of efficiency and not necessarily concern for the health of the planet
moved to Brown, more in word than in deed.
Now we plan to go back to Green, talking down ‘Green’ to countries and
peoples who were always Green and were coerced and coaxed to worship Black and
Brown. We are back to Rio.
We will sit and reflect.
We will wonder how far we’ve come and perhaps how far we’ve strayed from
roads we planned to take or roads that we didn’t map out but may have taken us
from a dismal here to a happier there.
The earth has moved ten times around the sun. That’s nothing for sun or moon. It’s a long time for a single human being and
long too for nations and peoples and paradigms obsessed with time to the point
that it is equated with money.
A lot can be done in 10 years. A lot can be done in 20. A lot of positive things. The interesting and indeed scary thing about
time is that a lot more can be undone in a given time-segment than can be done
or recovered. The ‘doing’ makes for a
lot of ‘feel-good’ but gets obliterated by the undoing. If we look back, we can ask ourselves ‘have
we done enough?’ We can also ask
ourselves ‘can we do enough?’ Most
importantly, we could ask ourselves ‘are we fooling ourselves?’ and ‘who are we
trying to fool?’
Twenty years ago, we boldly stated, ‘All states and all
people shall cooperate in the essential task of eradicating poverty’. We were confident that ‘states shall
cooperate in a spirit of global partnership to conserve, protect and restore
the health and integrity of the Earth’s ecosystem’. It was as though we all wished away the gross
inequalities that characterize the system of states and the gross inequalities
within them. It is as though we took for
granted that knowledge of impending disaster alone would obtain
cooperation. Maybe we underestimated
the greed of the greedy. Maybe we overestimated the commitment of the committed. Maybe we trusted too much. Maybe we thought talk would automatically
translate into walk.
These are things we need to talk about, twenty years after
‘Rio’ and ten years after
‘Johannesburg’. We can ask ‘can’t we be
like the bee?’ and we can ask, ‘should we ask, “can we be like the bee?”?’
[Closing address will be posted tomorrow]
4 comments:
FANTASTIC ARTICLE. THANKS!
great article. Some countries are reluctant to walk the talk-they should be named and shamed. But will it make a difference?
How can cooperate with anyone? USA seems to call the shots and the rest of the globe complies!
Can we be like the bee?
We can't because we pick the flowers for decorating our living rooms, bed rooms, dining rooms and bath rooms etc. etc. leaving the flowers to die separated from their trees and creating environments in flower vases for mosquitoes to breed. We also consume the honey produced by the bees claiming that it is good for health.
All against the nature and humanity. So how can we be like the bee?
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