We have a LOT of cool announcements/updates about the year ahead that will be coming during the next few weeks, and an all new website we are prepping to launch any day now, so stay tuned for more info and opportunities to get involved this year!
Since we heard Ed Begley Jr. on the radio here in LA this AM, we thought today would be an ideal to announce our Green Ambitions for 2007. We are very excited to renew our commitment to going green this year. While we always make every effort we can to minimize our impact on the planet and those that produce the goods we use, being on the road all year is a very consuming and polluting business, so we want you to help us in setting the example of making our ecological imprint as minimal as possible. Some of our current plans include:
1. Moving all of our print materials (we print all of that stuff you pick up at our booth, even when it's for our partners!) to eco friend paper – no old growth, using only recycled stock, non-toxic ink, and we're going to make our designs even cooler so you'll feel really guilty if you pick up our stuff only to throw it away!
2. Switching to less gas consuming/more eco friendly trucks and vans. Believe us, we'd MUCH rather be running on hybrids, saving the environment and gas, but we've yet to find a truck or van that will fit our space and durability needs that can do so, and riding bikes just isn't gonna work. So, for now, we are looking to switch to trucks and/or vans that can help to cut down on gas consumption and on the emissions we release when on the road.
3.Promoting recycling on the tours we take part in. We're going to work with our touring partners even more to try to increase recycling.
4. Taking more environmental groups out on the road with us! What bugs us more than anything is the lack of an environmental presence on so many of the tours and festivals we are at – we're making it our objective this year to get more and more of our environmental partners out and into the world, spreading the message about their important work.
Lokahi is an organization that prides itself to being open to anything and everything, and we know we've only hit the tip of the (quickly melting) iceberg as far as what we can be doing to 'Green Up'. So send us your ideas and suggestions on how we can go greener – we'll be featuring some of the best ideas on our blog this spring! And we need help reaching those objectives we listed above – if you have any suggestions on printers, eco friendly vehicles, recycling programs and more please get in contact with us: make a comment on this blog, send an email to info (at) lokahioutreach (dot) org, or send us a myspace message.
Thanks – we look forward to hearing your ideas!
Ed Begley Jr
lokahi
going green
environment
grassroots campaigning
Friday, January 26, 2007
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Our favorite people of the day...
Our favorite people of the day....
Check out Lokahi's official favorite people of the day:
"Veteran activists join tree protest
Article Last Updated: 01/23/2007 02:36:19 AM PST
BERKELEY — Two of the three women are older than the tree itself, but that didn't stop them Monday from climbing into a historic oak they are desperately trying to save.
Wearing sensible shoes and ear-to-ear smiles, Berkeley City Councilmember Betty Olds, 86; Save the Bay founder Sylvia McLaughlin, 90, and former Berkeley Mayor Shirley Dean, 71, climbed a metal ladder into an 80-year-old coast live oak Monday morning.
"Together we have nearly 250 years of political experience ... nobody's going to cut us down and nobody is going to cut the oaks down," said Dean, standing on a wooden platform that had been secured between tree branches.
A group of protesters took to the trees in early December when the University of California, Berkeley, announced it would raze more than three dozen trees to make room for a new $125 million sports training facility, parking lot and offices next to Memorial Stadium. "
You can read more of the article here.
There's something to be said for waking up and just acting on what you think is right in the face of a culture that has a lot of "wrongs" in it. I feel better knowing that the world still has lots and lots of people just like these ladies in it.
I hope I can, and will still WANT, drag myself up a tree to fight the good fight when I'm 90! Rock on grandma's!
activism
environmentalism
berkeley tree sitters
Check out Lokahi's official favorite people of the day:
"Veteran activists join tree protest
Article Last Updated: 01/23/2007 02:36:19 AM PST
BERKELEY — Two of the three women are older than the tree itself, but that didn't stop them Monday from climbing into a historic oak they are desperately trying to save.
Wearing sensible shoes and ear-to-ear smiles, Berkeley City Councilmember Betty Olds, 86; Save the Bay founder Sylvia McLaughlin, 90, and former Berkeley Mayor Shirley Dean, 71, climbed a metal ladder into an 80-year-old coast live oak Monday morning.
"Together we have nearly 250 years of political experience ... nobody's going to cut us down and nobody is going to cut the oaks down," said Dean, standing on a wooden platform that had been secured between tree branches.
A group of protesters took to the trees in early December when the University of California, Berkeley, announced it would raze more than three dozen trees to make room for a new $125 million sports training facility, parking lot and offices next to Memorial Stadium. "
You can read more of the article here.
There's something to be said for waking up and just acting on what you think is right in the face of a culture that has a lot of "wrongs" in it. I feel better knowing that the world still has lots and lots of people just like these ladies in it.
I hope I can, and will still WANT, drag myself up a tree to fight the good fight when I'm 90! Rock on grandma's!
activism
environmentalism
berkeley tree sitters
Monday, January 15, 2007
Dr. King on poverty, for MLK Day...
I pulled the following from Dr. King's book, "Where Do We Go From Here", published in 1967. Now 40 years old, it's striking how insightful and accurate his vision and predictions proved to be - I'm only copying the selections that deal with poverty here, but if you are interested, this work is definately worth checking out further.
Anyway, happy MLK day everyone.
"Another grave problem that must be solved if we are to live creatively in our world house is that of poverty on an international scale. Like a monstrous octopus, it stretches its choking, prehensile tentacles into lands and villages all over the world. Two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry at night. They are undernourished, ill-housed and shabbily clad. Many of them have no houses or beds to sleep in. Their only beds are the sidewalks of the cities and the dusty roads of the villages. Most of these poverty-stricken children of God have never seen a physician or a dentist.
There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we now have the resources to get rid of it.... Why should there be hunger and privation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life? ... There is no deficit in human resources; the deficit is in human will....
The time has come for an all-out war against poverty. The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled and feed the unfed. The well-off and the secure have too often become the indifferent and oblivious to the poverty and deprivation in their midst. The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds, and driven from the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern of “the least of these.
The first step in the world-wide war against poverty is passionate commitment.... The wealthy nations of the world must promptly initiate a massive, sustained Marshall Plan for Asia, Africa and South America. If they would allocate just two percent of their gross national product annually for a period of ten or twenty years for the development of the underdeveloped nations, mankind would go a long way toward conquering the ancient enemy, poverty....
... In the final analysis the rich must not ignore the poor because both rich and poor are tied together. They entered the same mysterious gateway of human birth, into the same adventure of mortal life.
All men are interdependent. Every nation is an heir of a vast treasure of ideas and labor to which both the living and the dead of all nations have contributed.... We are everlasting debtors to known and unknown men and women....
In a real sense, all life in interrelated. The agony of the poor impoverishes the rich; the betterment of the poor enriches the rich. We are inevitably our brother’s keepers because we are our brother’s brother. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly."
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
mlk
martin luther king
Anyway, happy MLK day everyone.
"Another grave problem that must be solved if we are to live creatively in our world house is that of poverty on an international scale. Like a monstrous octopus, it stretches its choking, prehensile tentacles into lands and villages all over the world. Two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry at night. They are undernourished, ill-housed and shabbily clad. Many of them have no houses or beds to sleep in. Their only beds are the sidewalks of the cities and the dusty roads of the villages. Most of these poverty-stricken children of God have never seen a physician or a dentist.
There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we now have the resources to get rid of it.... Why should there be hunger and privation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life? ... There is no deficit in human resources; the deficit is in human will....
The time has come for an all-out war against poverty. The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled and feed the unfed. The well-off and the secure have too often become the indifferent and oblivious to the poverty and deprivation in their midst. The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds, and driven from the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern of “the least of these.
The first step in the world-wide war against poverty is passionate commitment.... The wealthy nations of the world must promptly initiate a massive, sustained Marshall Plan for Asia, Africa and South America. If they would allocate just two percent of their gross national product annually for a period of ten or twenty years for the development of the underdeveloped nations, mankind would go a long way toward conquering the ancient enemy, poverty....
... In the final analysis the rich must not ignore the poor because both rich and poor are tied together. They entered the same mysterious gateway of human birth, into the same adventure of mortal life.
All men are interdependent. Every nation is an heir of a vast treasure of ideas and labor to which both the living and the dead of all nations have contributed.... We are everlasting debtors to known and unknown men and women....
In a real sense, all life in interrelated. The agony of the poor impoverishes the rich; the betterment of the poor enriches the rich. We are inevitably our brother’s keepers because we are our brother’s brother. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly."
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
mlk
martin luther king
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Youth Philanthropy
Found this interesting article today - check it out! Good piece on young people leading the pack when it comes to philanthropy, creating needed community programs and more. I always find it inspiring to read about the work of entrepreneurs around the country that are doing good.
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
philanthropy
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
philanthropy
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Ranking the Rich
Check out this interesting article I came across in the midst of my 'should be working but instead I'm web-surfing' afternoon…
"Rich countries spend $84 billion a year subsidizing their farmers. That’s nearly as much as they spend on foreign aid, which is about $29 a year for each of the world’s 2.7 billion people who live on less than $2 a day. Poor people often get less assistance than the rich world’s farm animals. The European Union, for example, doles out almost $30 per year for each sheep living there. In Norway and Switzerland, each cow gets nearly $1,000 of the government’s money a year. These subsidies push down global agricultural prices and undermine farmers in poorer countries. Bellying up to the government’s trough has never been so costly."
You can read more of this piece by Foreign Policy on their site, a good way to look at what the world's wealthiest nations are doing to help out the poorest.
Just yet another reminder that we've got to keep up the good fight as we move into 2007....
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
"Rich countries spend $84 billion a year subsidizing their farmers. That’s nearly as much as they spend on foreign aid, which is about $29 a year for each of the world’s 2.7 billion people who live on less than $2 a day. Poor people often get less assistance than the rich world’s farm animals. The European Union, for example, doles out almost $30 per year for each sheep living there. In Norway and Switzerland, each cow gets nearly $1,000 of the government’s money a year. These subsidies push down global agricultural prices and undermine farmers in poorer countries. Bellying up to the government’s trough has never been so costly."
You can read more of this piece by Foreign Policy on their site, a good way to look at what the world's wealthiest nations are doing to help out the poorest.
Just yet another reminder that we've got to keep up the good fight as we move into 2007....
global poverty
one campaign
poverty
activism
Friday, January 05, 2007
Keep going....
Check out this article in the Guardian UK about the need to keep up the fight against global poverty, and how youth especially can play a role in that cause.
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year!
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