Sunday, 11 September 2011

Cooperatives News

What are the main Challenges for the Cooperative movement today?
Interview with Charles Gould, Director General, ICA


IYC 2012




*UN Secretary-General's Message for 2011 IDC--2011-07-06 13:39:02
*"Youth, the future of co-operative enterprise"-ICA--2011-06-09 08:57:47
*The logo of 2012 - International Year of Cooperatives--2011-05-11 14:16:58
*"Youth, the future of cooperative enterprise"--2011-05-03 09:38:09
*Resolution adopted by the General Assembly--2011-04-15 09:07:16
*Goals of the International Year of Cooperatives--2011-04-15 09:04:08
*“Co-operative Enterprise Empowers Women”--2010-06-18 10:32:26
*ILO hails UN proclamation of 2012 as International Year of Cooperatives--2010-01-05 11:07:39
*United Nations Declares 2012 International Year of Cooperatives--2010-01-05 11:05:39
*UN proclaims 2012 International Year of Co-operatives--2009-12-28 09:27:56
*Ministry of Agriculture: Three Criteria for Model Farmers’ Specialized Cooperatives--2009-11-03 13:38:54
*Consumer Price of Vegetable Goes Down by 20% Through the Direct Purchase of Supermarkets in Xi An--2009-11-03 13:30:38
*Land Deposit-loaning Cooperative in Village--2009-11-03 13:27:08
*Hai Nan: Only Organized Farmers Have Their Own Voice to Market--2009-11-03 13:24:42
*Dairy Cooperative of Fu Meng County Becomes the “Mother Home” of Dairy Farmers--2009-11-03 13:22:12
*Vice-prime Minister Hui Liangyu: Devote Great Efforts to Farmers’ Specialized Cooperatives--2009-10-10 14:30:30
*Foreign Banks Explore the Rural Finance in China--2009-10-10 14:29:43
*Strengthen the Cooperatives’ Function in Protection of Quality and Security of Raw Milk--2009-10-10 14:28:40
*Person of the Year of CHINA CO-OPERATIVE ECONOMY 2008--2009-10-10 14:26:57
*From Cooperative to Co-op Federation--2009-10-10 14:26:10
*Foreign Financed TV Banks Do Hide-and-seek Trick with Domestic Farmers--2009-10-10 14:25:17
*Chinese Sichuan pepper and Carrefour--2009-10-10 14:23:57
*Shaan Xi Province Issued A Document to Support the Development of Specialized Farmers Cooperatives--2009-10-10 14:22:41
*Driving global recovery through co-operatives--2009-04-02 10:23:34
*Promoting agriculture in times of hardship--2009-02-18 13:12:42
*China endeavors to set up modern rural financial system--2009-02-18 13:12:03
*CPC pledges to improve social welfare of rural residents--2009-02-18 13:10:55
*President Hu addressed three top concerns in field tour--2009-02-18 12:26:38
*Chinese dairies seek to restore consumers' faith after scandal--2009-02-18 12:24:27
*Farmers urged to join co-ops--2009-02-18 12:23:38
*Fiji co-operative (FCUL) became a new member of ICA--2008-10-04 08:26:56
*Chinese President Hu Jintao visits a cooperative in Henan Province--2008-09-26 17:49:23
*Confronting Climate Change through Co-operative Enterprise--2008-08-26 14:50:56


The Co-operatives in 2012

2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives (IYC)
 

    The United Nations General Assembly has declared 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives (IYC), highlighting the contribution of cooperatives to socio-economic development, in particular recognizing their impact on poverty reduction, employment generation and social integration.
Main Goals of the Year:
* Increase public awareness about cooperatives and their contributions to socio-economic development and the achievement of MDGs 
* Promote the formation and growth of cooperatives
* Encourage Governments to establish policies, laws and regulation conducive to the formation, growth and stability of cooperatives








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Wednesday, 7 September 2011

UNESCO's Priorities for the XXI Century

Women and gender, science, engineering
and technology

"The gender dimension describes the way in which culturally organized differences between men and women interact with historically and socially diverse scientific and technological practices, and their meanings. Scientific and technological cultures and practices shape gendered social relations and, in turn, are shaped by them. Thus the S&T that each culture has are a consequence, in part, of local and global gender relations, and each cultureís gender relations are the effect, in part, of past local and global S&T changes"


World Science Report (UNESCO, 1996)



AFRICA      Back to top





ARAB STATES      Back to top
  • Info-Ethics
    National Symposium, Cairo (Egypt), 27-28 April 1999.
  • The Interaction  of Arab Women  with Science and Technology
    (Abu-Dhabi Declaration)
    Doha (United Arab Emirates), 24-26 April 1999.
    Les relations entre femmes arabes,sciences et technologies
    (Déclaration d'Abu Dhabi)
    Doha (Emirats arabes unis), 24-26 avril 1999.
  • Regional Conference for Arab Ministers of Higher Education and Scientific Research
    Riyad (Saudi Arabia), 19 April 1999.
  • Water and Desertification in the Arab Region
    First Arab Conference, Cairo (Egypt), 17-18 April 1999.
  • The Present Status of Scientific Research in the Arab Region
    Expert Group Meeting, Beirut (Lebanon), 14-15 March 1999.
  • Science and Technology Policies for the 21st Century
    STEMARN Regional Expert Group Meeting/Workshop,
    Beirut (Lebanon), 10-13 March 1999.
  • Attitudes autour des sciences
    Colloque, Tunis (Tunisie), 27-28 janvier 1998.
  • Third Arab Conference on Modern Biotechnology and Areas of Application in the Arab Countries
    Cairo (Egypt), 14-17 December 1998.
  • Science, Technology and Society
    Conference, Beirut (Lebanon), 26-28 November 1998.
  • The Public Understanding of Science
    International Conference for Scientific Editors,
    Sharm El-Sheikh, Sinai (Egypt) 9 June 1998.
  • Femmes, science et technologie: état des lieux et perspectives
    Colloque international, Tunis (Tunisie), 20-22 November 1997.






ASIA AND PACIFIC     Back to top






EUROPE AND NORTH-AMERICA      Back to top





LATIN AMERICA AND CARIBBEAN      Back to top
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Ban ki-Moom Message on International Literacy Day, 8 September 2011

United Nations Secretary-General's Message on International Literacy Day, 8 September 2011

05.09.2011

This year’s commemoration of International Literacy Day under the theme “Literacy and Peace” offers an important reminder that the critical tasks of preventing violence, calming tensions and ending conflicts all demand attention to this fundamental aspect of human dignity.
Literacy unlocks the capacity of individuals to imagine and create a more fulfilling future.  It opens the way to greater justice, equality and progress.  Literacy can help societies heal, advance political processes and contribute to the common good.
Despite progress, illiteracy continues to afflict millions of people, especially women and girls.  In 2009, roughly two thirds of the world’s estimated 793 million illiterate adults were female.  That same year, some 67 million primary-school-aged children and 72 million adolescents were denied their right to an education.
The costs are enormous.  Illiteracy exacerbates cycles of poverty, ill health and deprivation.  It weakens communities and undermines democratic processes through marginalization and exclusion.  These and other impacts can combine to destabilize societies.
International Literacy Day is an opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to the goal of ensuring that all people can read and write.  In the process, we will enhance inherent individual dignity and advance the universal goal of peace.
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Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO on the occasion of the International Literacy Day - 8 September 2011

Message from Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO on the occasion of the International Literacy Day - 8 September 2011

05.09.2011
This year, International Literacy Day places a special focus on the essential relationship between literacy and peace.
Lasting peace is founded on respect for human rights and social justice. 
Literacy, the foundation of all education and lifelong learning, is one of these rights.
Literacy is a prerequisite for peace because it carries multiple benefits, cutting across the human, cultural, social, political and economic spheres. 
In today’s knowledge driven societies, lack of literacy is more than ever synonymous with exclusion and marginalization.
According to the most recent figures (2009), 793 million adults lack basic literacy skills, the majority are girls and women. A further 67 million children of primary school age are not in primary school and 72 million adolescents of lower secondary school age are also missing out their right to an education, running the risk of creating a new generation of illiterates.
This unacceptable situation is holding back all efforts to reduce poverty and advance human development. 
It is an infringement of human rights and fundamental freedoms, and a threat to peace and security.
Literacy is a development accelerator and a force for peace.
First, literacy empowers individuals, equipping them with the skills and confidence to seek out vital information and to make informed choices that have a direct impact on their families and communities.
Second literacy is a condition for individuals to effectively participate in democratic processes, to claim a voice in community organizations, gain political knowledge and thereby contribute to shaping the quality of public policies.
Third, literacy programs strengthen mutual understanding by enabling people to share ideas and to express, preserve and develop their cultural identity and diversity. 
No country can hope to establish lasting conditions for peace unless it finds ways of building mutual trust between its citizens through inclusive education systems that promote mutual understanding, respect, tolerance and dialogue.
It is crucial to integrate literacy in peace building processes in order to plant the seeds of peace, foster dialogue and reconciliation, and give youth and adults the skills they need to seek decent employment.
The 2011 International Literacy Prizes reward ground-breaking programs that show the central role of literacy in promoting human rights, gender equality, conflict resolution and cultural diversity. All programs highlight that even in the most difficult contexts, good quality literacy programs are working and bringing lasting change into the lives of youth and adults.
Investing in literacy programs is a sensible and essential development choice. Literacy is a key component of strategies to promote sustainable development and peace. It is central to achieving Education for All and the Millennium Development Goals.
The world urgently needs increased political commitment to literacy backed by adequate resources to scale up effective programs. Today I urge governments, international organizations, civil society and the private sector to make literacy a policy priority, so that every individual can develop their potential, and actively participate in shaping more sustainable, just and peaceful societies.

Source: Official messages from Irina Bokova on the occasion of International Days with which UNESCO is associated
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Friday, 2 September 2011

UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development: Links between the Global Initiatives in Education

UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005 - 2014) :
Links between the Global Initiatives in Education








- 504 Million Illiterates in Asia and the Pacific
2007 figures estimated by UNESCO Institute for Statistics in September 2008
map
Consult       ⇒ Map with estimated figures for 2015 
  ⇒ Map with figures for 2004 
  ⇒ Map with figures for 2000 
⇒ Map with figures for 1995 

overview

Coountry Data
Afghanistan *
(28.1%)		 India
(66.0%)		 Maldives
(97.0%)		 Papua New Guinea
(57.8%)
Bangladesh
(53.5%)		 Indonesia
(91.4%)		 Mongolia
(97.3%)		 Philippines
(93.4%)
Bhutan
(55.6%)		 Iran
(84.7%)		 Myanmar *
(89.9%)		 Sri Lanka
(91.5%)
Cambodia
(76.3%)		 Lao PDR
(73.2%)		 Nepal
(56.5%)		 Thailand
(94.1%)
China
(93.3%)		 Malaysia
(91.9%)		 Pakistan
(54.9%)		 Viet Nam *
(90.3%)
2007 figures estimated by UNESCO Institute for Statistics in September 2008
*1999-2000 figures estimated by UNESCO Institute for Statistics in September 2006

Note: The information at regional and national levels is the latest data taken from UNESCO Institute for Statistics and other international organisations, in particular UN, UNICEF and the World Bank.




Your feed-back / comments to education@accu.or.jp

UNESCO STATISTICS
The Asia-Pacific Literacy Data Base is jointly developed by ACCU and UNESCO
with support of the Tokio Marine and Fire Insurance Company, Limited



Copyright (c) Asia-Pacific Cultural Centre for UNESCO (ACCU),1997-2010
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The United Nations literacy decade (UNLD)

THE WORLD is observing the International Literacy Day on September 8 . Established in 1965 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), the International Literacy Day  is observed every year, on this day.

Especially dedicated to the cause of literacy, the World Literacy Day is observed with the aim to spread the message of literacy among children and youth living across the world.

Since its inception, this day became a special occasion for literacy awareness and many educational programmes featured the particular day. But in the year 1990, the United Nations General Assembly provided a boost to global literacy by announcing that year as International Literacy Year. The special year signified the ongoing commitment of the world community to recognise and support literacy as a key to personal development and to the socio-economic progress of nations.

Since 2000, for spreading literacy across the world in large scale various governments of the world have launched four initiatives in cooperation with several agencies of the United Nations. These four initiatives are:

Education for all; the millennium development goals; the United Nations literacy decade and; the United Nations decade of education for sustainable development.

Education for All (EFA): The world education forum organised on 26-28 April 2000 in Dakar, adopted the Dakar framework for action, ’Education for All: Meeting our collective commitments’, which sets six goals with a target date of 2015.

The millennium development goals (MDGs) : In 2000, the UN General Assembly adopted the millennium declaration as a way of expressing common worldwide priorities in development, which governments and international agencies would work towards focussing on eight goals with a target date of 2015.

The United Nations literacy decade (UNLD): The UN General Assembly launched the literacy decade from 2003 to 2012 to mobilise the resources and political will to meet the learning needs of illiterate people living around the world.

The United Nations decade of education of sustainable development (DESD): The UN General Assembly called for the decade of education for sustainable development from 2005 to 2014 to mobilise efforts on the widespread global implementation of education for the same.

Besides above mentioned programmes, several other educational missions have been launched by the governments of world to make the people literate. In India too, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, Adult Education Programme, District Primary Education Programme and many such initiatives have been introduced by the government to make the people literate.

Of course, such literacy programmes have become successful, but still a fair portion of country’s population in illiterate. According to stats of United Nations there are about four billion literate people across the world. However, making the whole world literate is still an unaccomplished goal.
The fact is that without making the whole world literate we cannot expect all round development. Most importantly, our country is lagging behind other developing countries in the field of education. We blame the government for the dwindling literacy rate in the country, but we hardly care for teaching our illiterate neighbours. On this special day, let us vow to make our country as well as the world literate. It is possible if we begin on our own by sparing some time for uneducated people living around us.
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Thursday, 1 September 2011

2011 CGI Annual Meeting

President Clinton Announces Program and Featured Attendees for the 2011 Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting - September 01, 2011


What:
2011 CGI Annual Meeting (www.clintonglobalinitiative.org) 


Where:
Sheraton New York Hotel & Towers
811 7th Avenue at 52nd Street
New York, NY 10019

When:
September 20-22, 2011


Applying for Credentials:
Press registration is now open to members of the media for the 2011 CGI Annual Meeting. To apply, please complete the form at http://bit.ly/pressreg2011.

Barack Obama, President of the United States; Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, U.S. Department of State; Luis Alberto Moreno, President, Inter-American Development Bank; Tony Blair, Former Prime Minster of the United Kingdom; Michelle Bachelet, Former President of Chile and First Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women; Gro Harlem Brundtland, Former Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Norway; Muhammad Yunus; Chelsea Clinton; Trudie Styler & Sting; John Chambers, Chairman and CEO of Cisco; Bob Diamond, Chief Executive of Barclays; Bob McDonald, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO of Procter & Gamble; Muhtar Kent, Chairman and CEO of the Coca-Cola Company; Indra Nooyi, Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo; Paul Polman, Chief Executive Officer of Unilever; Jim Rogers, Chairman, President & CEO of Duke Energy; Helene D. Gayle, President and CEO of CARE USA; Dikembe Mutombo; Geena Davis; and K’NAAN among the key participants for the Seventh Annual Meeting

 Meeting to Address Global Challenges through three Annual Meeting Topics: Jobs, Jobs, Jobs; Increasing Sustainable Consumption; and Empowering Girls and Women

 

 

 




NEW YORK – Today, President Bill Clinton announced the program and featured attendees for the seventh Annual Meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) to be held September 20-22 in New York City. This year’s gathering will bring together an estimated 1,200 diverse stakeholders, including current and former heads of state, Fortune 500 CEOs, national and local government officials, and leaders from the nonprofit sector to devise and implement workable solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges. 

“Since we began in 2005, CGI members have made great progress in addressing critical global issues by making more than 2,000 commitments through CGI that have and will improve the lives of more than 300 million people in more than 180 countries,” President Clinton said. “As many of these commitments come to fruition, I am proud that we will be showcasing the tangible impact they have made.”
This year, the CGI program is focused on three primary topic areas:

  • Jobs, Jobs, Jobs: Generating Employment for the 21st Century, which will highlight effective workforce training programs, showcase innovative government incentives that catalyze inclusive job growth, and examine market-leading business developments that can sustainably increase profits, productivity, and prosperity around the world. This topic area will build on the work of CGI America, the first CGI event focused on job creation and driving economic growth in the U.S., which took take place this past June in Chicago.
  • Sustainable Consumption: Ensuring Long-term Prosperity on a Finite Planet, which will explore how, by redefining consumption, organizations can quickly respond to the realities of impending resource constraints and instability while ensuring economic growth.
  • Girls and Women: Scaling What Works, which will return as a topic area for this year’s
Annual Meeting and will build on the continued success of past efforts by taking a deeper look at what is working in girls and women’s empowerment and highlighting areas where more resources could make a significant impact.

Other special sessions will address critical issues in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the role architecture, sports, and the arts play in fostering positive change. The complete program, session descriptions, and participants are available online at www.clintonglobalinitiative.org/ourmeetings.

President Barack Obama will join President Bill Clinton again at the 2011 Annual Meeting of CGI in New York.
Among the other confirmed attendees include Bob McDonald, chairman of the board, president, and CEO, Procter & Gamble; Chelsea Clinton; Denis O’Brien, chairman, Digicel; Dikembe Mutombo, chairman and president, Dikembe Mutombo Foundation, Inc.; Geena Davis, founder, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media; Gro Harlem Brundtland, former prime minister of the Kingdom of Norway; Hillary Rodham Clinton, secretary of state, U.S. Department of State; Helene D. Gayle, president and CEO, CARE USA; Indra Nooyi, chairman and CEO, PepsiCo; Jim Rogers, chairman, president and CEO, Duke Energy; John Chambers, chairman and CEO, Cisco; K’NAAN; Luis Alberto Moreno, president, Inter-American Development Bank; Mark Tercek, president and CEO, the Nature Conservancy; Michelle Bachelet, former president of Chile and first under-secretary-general and executive director, UN Women; Muhammad Yunus, founder, Grameen Bank; Muhtar Kent, Chairman and CEO of the Coca-Cola Company; Paul Polman, chief executive officer, Unilever; Premal Shah, president, Kiva.org; Bob Diamond, Jr., chief executive, Barclays; Trudie Styler & Sting; Tony Blair, former prime minster of the United Kingdom; Vikki Spruill, chief executive officer, the Ocean Conservancy. 
In a special ceremony, President Clinton will also present the fifth annual Clinton Global Citizen Awards, which recognize remarkable individuals for their leadership in addressing global challenges in philanthropy, government, civil society, and the corporate sector including:
  • Trudie Styler & Sting, founders, the Rainforest Fund will be honored for their commitment to protecting rainforests around the world and for defending the rights of the indigenous peoples who live there. 
  • Philippe Douste-Blazy, chair of the board, UNITAID will be honored for the French Government’s innovative financing of UNITAID to expand access to health for the world’s most disadvantaged people.
  • Denis Mukwege, founder and medical director, the Panzi Hospital of Bukavu will be honored for his commitment to healing the women and girls of the Congo who have fallen victim to sexual violence as a result of the ongoing war.
  • Mhammed Abbad Andaloussi, chairman and CEO, Injaz Morocco will be honored for his visionary approach to transform the Moroccan education system by mobilizing public and private partnerships to create better schools.
  • Güler Sabanci, chairman and managing director, Sabanci Holding will be honored for her leadership to empower girls and women around the world, and for her commitment to social, cultural and economic development throughout Turkey.   
The ceremony will also include live performances by Sting and K’NAAN.

View and share session webcasts from the 2011 CGI Annual Meeting by visiting: http://live.clintonglobalinitiative.org and follow @ClintonGlobal (http://twitter.com/clintonglobal) for meeting news and highlights. The event hashtag is #CGI2011.

All media must apply for credentials and must be approved by CGI in order to attend. The deadline to apply is Friday, September 16 at 5 p.m. ET. Journalists may apply for credentials on site, but pre-registered media will be given priority.
CGI strongly recommends submitting an online application in advance of the deadline, as credentials will be processed on a rolling basis. We will notify you when a decision has been made in regards to your application. For questions about press registration, contact Tracey Foster at tracey.foster@clintonglobalinitiative.org.
Members of the press who have received email confirmation from CGI to attend the meeting are encouraged to pick up their credentials on Monday, September 19 from 10:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m. To pick up your credential, a valid government-issued ID is required.  
###
About the Clinton Global Initiative
Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) convenes global leaders to devise and implement innovative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges. Since 2005, CGI Annual Meetings have brought together nearly 150 current and former heads of state, 18 Nobel Prize laureates, hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations, major philanthropists, directors of the most effective nongovernmental organizations, and prominent members of the media. These CGI members have made over 2,000 commitments, which have already improved the lives of 300 million people in more than 180 countries. When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued in excess of $63 billion. The 2011 Annual Meeting will take place Sept. 20-22 in New York City.

More than 1,000 members will attend, including current and former heads of state, chief executives of corporations, philanthropists, thought leaders, prominent members of the media, and directors of nonprofit organizations. Each member creates a Commitment to Action – a detailed plan for addressing a major global challenge in the areas of Economic Empowerment, Education, Environment & Energy, and Global Health. Throughout the event, members share successful strategies, forge partnerships, and gain practical insights that they can use to enhance their work.



Watch live streaming video from cgi_plenary at livestream.com

This year, CGI also convened CGI America, a meeting focused on developing ideas for driving economic growth in the United States. The CGI community also includes CGI U, which hosts an annual meeting for undergraduate and graduate students, and CGI Lead, which engages a select group of young CGI members for leadership development and collective commitment-making. For more information, visit www.clintonglobalinitiative.org.
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