PTW: April 2016

PTW HEALTH|EDUCATION|WORLD|CHARITY

Feature article

Dr Alessandro Demaio co-founder of NCDFREE

VOLUME 4 EDITION 2

May 2016

CONTENTS Scroll through and read the magazine, or click the article you wish to read.

Feature Interview Dr Alessandro Demaio co-founder of NCDFREE Benjamin Bugeja Art Director / Designer

May Edition

Graham Hill

Editorial

GLOBESITY

Toxic High Road

FIND OUT MORE

contact@projectthirdworld.org

Going from Bigger to better.

To

Consume

Editorial

Or ToConserve?

C

onsider a normal day- waking up to your smart-phone alarm, checking your ‘fan mail’ on Facebook, Instagram, twitter, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Viber, Linked In, other social media accounts, email accounts 1, 2 and 3 half-awake to see how much happened in the 6 hours of sleep you managed. This is followed by struggling out of bed and heading for a dozen minutes of high-pressure hot water. You eat the cheapest, most instant breakfast or more-often-thannot, a breakfast-in-a-drink. If it’s filling, you’re satisfied.

CHIRAG LODHIA Chief Editor and Founder

You travel via the service station to fill up the weekly 60 litres of fuel; at work you churn through endless papers on the photocopier, printer and fax whilst being in a building that has more computers and machines than actual people. During this time, you spend nine hours of your day illuminated by globes.

You look forward to your lunch break for an easy, quick-fix meal; as long as it has meat and some other ingredients to get you through, you’re satisfied.

There’s another event to attend this weekend, automatically equating to couture upgrade.

Understandably, you want the clothes that look the most expensive, emphasised by the branding on the clothes, and make a statement; but at the same time you want something cheap because you feel you’ll have to do the same next week. Making the stop after work, it turns out that a sale is on in the store, and suddenly you’re walking out with six bags instead of one!

Finally, you head home, make a meaty meal and turn to the TV for entertainment.

Entertainment involving celebrities and their multi-million dollar lifestyles all equating to ‘the good life’ or ‘the American Dream’. You then go to bed, not before spending a couple more hours of your sleep on social media and searching how to get the life shown on the television.

When overlooked, it sounds like an innocent and normal day which many might experience or aspire to experience. It may not seem as though much has happened, but it has been a day full of consumption. Consumption itself is not negative. Every life-form consumes in some capacity to survive. One species however consumes very differently to others and utilises a current medium of exchange in the form of coins and banknotes to value our consumables.

Economic Machine Fuelled By Consumerism In the ‘sophisticated’, ‘western civilization' that is spreading across the globe, consumption through money spending is a vital part of developing a nation’s economy. Consumer spending is an important economic indicator for the consumer, or society’s confidence in a nation’s economy.

Evidence and data of increased spending gives businesses confidence to supply more products to meet the consumer demands, resulting in more favourable prices for goods and services. The economist logic follows that the more a product is bought, the cheaper the product becomes through volume. It is

part of the basis for why a 3kg box of corn flakes is approximately half the cost of a 500gram box of cornflakes.

Economic development is built from expenditure, which in turn, comes from consumption; as many people will argue, is central to developing national health facilities, education, roads, businesses and more. Q.E.DWhen people consume, it leads to tax revenue from G.S.T and other government taxes that can enable better standards of living for an entire nation.

function of our modern culture.

Only by producing and selling goods and services does capitalist markets of ‘western civilisation’ in its present form work’. The single most important measure of economic growth is, after all, the gross national product (GNP), the sum total of goods and services produced by a given society in a given year; a measure of the Our consumption of goods is a success of a consumer society.

Exceeding Grasp and Reach

Whilst placing a dollar, or shilling, or rupee value to products might give them perceived values, it does not account for the true costs and realities of the products. Looking at water consumption from showers alone, the BBC and Alliance Water Efficiency reported the average shower length in the UK and USA is 8 minutes whilst Canada have 75% of the population spending 5 minutes or more in the shower. The average shower across these 3 countries is approximately 60 litres of water consumption. Countries such as Indonesia, India and Japan substitute a shower for a fully-immersed bath which consumes 50-80 litres of water. The monetary value of this water consumption is less than a cent (USD) per shower- such a low monetary value can be why people don’t associate water with high consumption.

This is a huge volume of water, especially when multiplied by the population of earth's usage. Yet, this is only a small proportion of water consumption per day. According to experts, food waste accounts for a significant proportion of water waste. Research suggests we are using approximately 70% of available global freshwater to irrigate crops and produce food. Freshwater supplies are essential to feeding the human population, and as a population, we have made incredible headway in solving global hunger. That success and momentum has lead the United Nations, backed by realistic studies to believe by 2030 we can end world hunger and ensure access to food for all people, in particular the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round.

Human water use wouldn’t be an issue if it was infinite; unfortunately, freshwater is very much finite and thus the extent to which we can produce food to feed the world is finite. According to the Stockholm International Water Institute, 40% of food purchased in the United States alone is thrown away.

Consider too that the World Health Organisation stated in 2014 that 1.9 billion adults are overweight; which is increasing at a dangerous rate. Not only are we overeating, but we still have food to waste. Over-eating doesn’t correlate with over-nutrition though; W.H.O also states that many people who are overweight also suffer under-nutrition.

This of course doesn’t represent the entire world population, but it is becoming such a large global problem that overeating has surpassed the issue of hunger based on population. The W.H.O have coined the term ‘double burden of disease’ in which many lowand middle-income countries face dealing with problems of infectious disease and under-nutrition whilst also facing an upsurge of diseases such as obesity, overweight, heart disease and more.

Furthermore, if the trends of overeating, overconsumption and wasting increase, the U.N’s goals might not be as realistic if much of the freshwater supply is being used to, once again, feed only those who can afford it under the pressure of supply-and-demand.

Click me for an interactive infographic on Obesity

Food In , Pollution Out

Environmentalists like to value consumption on the commodity of fossil fuels. Fuel and energy consumption has been an almost exhausted campaign above others, yet fossil fuel use has overwhelmingly trended upwards as a planet.

Whilst some countries mays sign pledges to reduce carbon emissions, countries such as India and China with minimal environmental sustainability objectives have escalated the issue with their huge economies. The World Bank estimates that in 2013, 13,166.7 million metric tons of oil equivalent was consumed globally.

Yet, energy and fuel aren’t the only consumption forms being destructive to our environment.

The human population’s growing appetite for meat will also be essential to curb if we are to avoid further damage. Currently emissions from livestock make up almost 15% of global emissions, with beef and dairy making up 65% of the livestock emissions. The United Nations predict meat consumption to rise 75% by 2050.

Based on such figures, agriculture emissions will consume the entire world’s carbon budget by 2050, meaning every other sector of industry, transport included, would have to be completely zero-carbon.

If you’re wondering why you haven’t heard about this issue, it’s perhaps because governments and civil society don’t want to receive the backlash from intruding on people’s love of eating meat despite the implications of this potentially toxic relationship. Professor Keith Richards at the University of Cambridge, one of the researchers behind the consumption of meat studies stated “this is not a radical vegetarian argument; it is an argument about eating meat in sensible amounts as part of a healthy, balanced diet."

Rob Bailey, the report’s lead author added it was “pretty disappointing” that in developed countries, where meat and dairy is highest, awareness of livestock’s impact on the climate is low and willingness to change is low."

The issue isn’t segregated just to wealthier countries.

Statistically China has had the highest increase in meat consumption over recent years and many developing and underdeveloped nations are looking to meat as a viable source of feed for their population.

Naturally, food and agriculture organisations feel that people should have the right to any range of food and be given the knowledge and information to make healthy choices, but nevertheless large proportions of society are still choosing cheap, meat-based options that not only increase the burden on ecosystems, but also health systems, with excessive animal protein consumption linked to cancer and cardiovascular risk. In particular, meat and processed meat is convincingly associated with a modest increased risk of bowel cancer. So if you’re buying meat in large sums and rationalising it as ‘giving back to the economy’, remember to consider how much money will need to come back to you in the form of health expenses.

Still Homo Sapiens What about overconsumption of food in general? The body exerts a strong defence against undernutrition and weight loss, but applies a much weaker resistance to overconsumption and weight gain. This biological function have been passed through human evolution as a survival mechanism for when food was no guarantee. These principles influence how appetite control operates and this constitutes one form of vulnerability to weight gain. Overconsumption comes much more naturally than controlling our intake. Even within food groups, our brain and appetite are wired to naturally crave energy-dense foods such as sugars and fats over low G.I and low energy-foods dating back to our evolutionary timeline.

Apart from the survival mechanisms inbuilt into humans, there is also a connection to the bodies stress response mechanism and the increased intake and consumption of food and in modern society, increased attainment of material goods. If consumerism wasn’t complex enough, ironically, overeating and overconsumption of food in-turn can further trigger the body’s stress response, and studies are showing that increasing attainment of material possessions can also create stress; further creating a vicious circle.

The consumption beast, the marketing witch and the wardrobe If one elephant in the room is food consumption, the other is material consumption. The Australian Bureau of Statistics released data in its last national census that families are spending more of their budget on clothing than ever before. With an increased appetite for material goods also comes a need for cheaper items, especially when our bank accounts aren’t inflating to the same extent. In order to meet the growing demands of global consumers for cheap products at low prices, many companies, large and small, are turning to economically underdeveloped countries to keep their costs down whilst increasing their profit margins.

In outsourcing their operations to overseas sites, companies take advantage of extremely poor workers in the developing world and demand fast-paced, excessive working hours, poor working conditions and minimum or below minimum wages in countries with an already incredibly low minimum wage; all in the name of profit and monetary wealth. Many workers in these countries experience serious injuries and death and in working for these companies, have been subject to countless and ongoing human rights violations.

As one of the largest international clothing companies, Nike faced scrutiny globally for their human rights violations. By 1997 they became synonymous with human rights violations, slave-work, forced overtime and abuse. After coming under this scrutiny, Nike’s profits still maintained $163.8 million dollars. Nike shouldn’t be singled out of a global problem. Baptist World Aid Australia reported that nine out of ten Australian clothing companies don’t know where their cotton is sourced and these companies fail to pay overseas workers enough to meet their basic living needs, despite their CEO’s or Australian owners and workers making considerable profits.

After coming under this scrutiny, Nike’s profits still maintained $163.8 million dollars. Nike shouldn’t be singled out of a global problem .

Whilst the consumer attempts to gain more for less, there are still costs, and it is historically poorer, more vulnerable individuals who suffer under the hands of wealthy tycoons, corporate business owners and increasing global consumer mentality. It is always important to consider that gaining more for less might mean gaining less for more for someone else.

An article published by the Wall Street Journal argues that in developing nations, ‘slave labour’ is better than no labour at all, as it brings income that would otherwise not exist for the country. The author highlighted that when put under pressure to be socially responsible, companies would rather move their operations to another country in order to maintain their profits.

Psychologists also emphasis the relationship between materialism and happiness is complex. People who have more realistic desires are more satisfied than those who have unattainable desires, but financial satisfaction is more closely related to life satisfaction in impoverished nations than in wealthier nations.

Furthermore, when basic needs are not met, including social satisfaction, relationship and friendship satisfactions, it appears that how much one owns actually becomes a more critical predictor of happiness.

Finally, people who spend in pursuit of experiential goals tend to be happier than those who spend in pursuit of purely material goals.

Whilst it may be part of our biology, blame for the perceived spread of materialism in modern society is often directed on marketing with many companies encouraging the excessive pursuit of their goods. Victoria's Secret has created an internationally recognised label and empire from forms of clothing that remain hidden under other garments. In a television advertising campaign, a model quotes "Give me everything I want, and nothing I need".

The marketing brain and the suffering mind

Why does society value materials and these brands the way it do does? What allows society to ignore the human rights violations they are accomplices to through their consumer choices?

What could be leading to excess consumerism? Psychologists theorise materialism seems to develop as a method for coping with uncertainty and self-doubt, but is also a byproduct of the natural tendency to compare one's self with others.

By placing a female lead on the commercial who is herald by a social majority as the paradigm of beauty, popularity and success; together with a phrase that reiterates and exploits the psychological theory stated above, it becomes obvious why such a clothing company based on garments that are not seen to the public can become an international profitmachine. It’s easy to single out the large companies, but all forms of advertising play on these subtle aspects of our psychology by constantly comparing ourselves to models and individuals who society places on their pillar of popularity, success and of importance. Despite the mounting studies that show consumption, especially of fashionable and material objects are not resulting in long-term happiness for the consumers, people are more likely to listen to the advice which their social icons give, rather than the statistics report.

Virtual Happiness or Actual Sadness?

Consumerism isn’t simply in what we are consuming, but also how we are consuming.

Sociology studies show online shoppers exhibit impulsive and compulsive behaviours around shopping whilst quality-conscious shoppers were not likely to purchase online. Studies showing that online shopping attracts compulsive and impulsive consumption without long-term satisfaction would be music-to-the-ears of corporations looking to increase profits.

One form of consumption that is often overlooked is excessive use of information technology. GWI reports since January 2016, over 2 billion internet users have social media accounts with users having an average of 5.5 social media accounts and spending more than 1.72 hours per day on social media and average 6 hours online. Psychologists from the University

of Washington published findings that businesses focused on facilitating social media are part of the fastest growing and most valuable sector of today’s economy.

Aside of the economic consequences of social media use, studies are showing increasing evidence to the compelling argument that social media use has significant impact on mental health. Already this year a study from The Cyberpsychology, Behaviour and Social Networking Journal found the more Facebook was used, the worse they felt and the more their life satisfaction diminished over time. Individuals were found to compare their own lives to those on social media and perceived the online forums to be consistent with their actual lives. Of course, we all know social media is simply a snapshot of what people want to share about their lives, but it is the lack in true understanding and conscious thought of this when we browse the internet where such an issue can come from.

From another perspective, similar studies show that young children are not only more susceptible to social media compared to adult counterparts, but are also using social media to a much larger proportion.

Furthermore, middle and high-school students are being found more likely to use social media networking sites for more than 2 hours per day if they had unmet needs for mental support. This amount of use is also independently associated with poor self-rating of mental health and experiences of high levels of psychological distress and suicidal ideation.

It shouldn’t be required, but nevertheless, academic studies show that social media is increasing targeted-marketing.

Older children and adolescents in particular are being targetmarketed towards sugary drinks, fast food, candy and other unhealthy snacks. The brands for these products are also reported to use peer-pressure by persuading children to ‘like’ and ‘share’ these products with their friends; it is thereby no surprise that social media can also lead to both poor physical health, and mental health.

As social media continues to grow, and as more businesses close physical stores and turn to online mediums to sell their products, there is a strong possibility that impulsive and compulsive consumption behaviours may grow, along with the negative impacts on mental health creating a downward spiral, especially with target-marketing strategies that social media companies are enhancing. What better way to make profits than take advantage of a society which spends a significant proportion of their day online which is correlated to impulsive and compulsive buying of your product due to peer-pressure, poor self-esteem and life satisfaction in-part caused from that same online medium along with shortlived happiness from your products and the feeling that they need to continue to buy products in order to satisfy their happiness.

The Grand Crescendo This article alone has been a head-bash of statistics, research and studies, and is perhaps only a pool in the mountain of studies all concluding one overarching reality: that a materialistic lifestyle is associated with diminished subjective well-being and even diminished health for humanity, the environment and our fellow species’. In spite of this, many people continue to pursue materialistic goals rather

than pursue goals that are more beneficial for their well-being and the global wellbeing.

The true consequences of this reality have not yet come. In only the past 50 years, the human population has more than doubled.

This doesn’t seem as concerning until you consider that, if that trend continues, then the human population may again double in less than 50 years. With our current 7 billion people, the globe has to produce 70 billion animals per year just to raise and slaughter for consumption. Now let’s consider transport again, fossil fuels, medicines,

growing population that demands large dwellings for all. Andy Warhol once said “I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want”, and if our consumption trends continue, this unique art may be lost for good. As the human population is only going upward, the pressure of food stock, energy consumption, water consumption and even physical land consumption from individuals trying to live the ‘big dream’ along with animal agriculture taking up increasing amounts of land, we can expect a very stressful future that can severely impact the health of all life on earth, for the worst.

Yet, when considering the stresses of dayto-day life including the perceived stress marketing campaigns place on us online and on television, the physical stressors from our environment and increasingly populated world, and stresses that come from poor health and lifestyle choices, it doesn’t take long to consider why consumerism is an issue of the global society of today, and not simply that of a few wealthy individuals in the future.

agriculture, industry and more. As it is, consumerism might help the economy, but it is directly an accomplice to poorer mental and physical health, animal abuse, human rights violations, global warming, and paradoxically, might jeopardise access to food and clean water in the future.

The ‘big life’ isn’t complete without a big house and luxury assets either, and so along with increased land required for agriculture, society will ultimately destroy what’s left of our natural resources and land to house a

It’s also important to realise that the businesses which thrive on consumption are also part of the issue. These businesses naturally side with the economic argument made at the beginning of this article. Whilst water loss and food waste do occur too much in homes, they also happen through inefficient food harvesting, transport, distribution, and processing and storage methods.

The argument that low-wage labour is better than no-labour is one which capitalist markets implore.

In economics, peaks and troughs in business occur all time, but these are far more erratic and crisis-prone in a capitalist market that does not include responsible government interventions.

In such capitalist-strong markets, reduction in consumerism results in the wealthy become wealthier, and the poor struggle to maintain a foothold on their standard of living. It is a sinister irony that those earning high profits whilst violating human rights should simultaneously reason that we shouldn’t stop consuming their products out of appeal to humanity.

Deeply Rooted Trees Economists, along with anyone who makes a living from consumerism will naturally loath this notion of excess consumerism, however even the Chief Executive of Nike, Mr Parker himself stated "Ignorance is not bliss…You have to understand the systemic issues and work with factory partners to solve them."

Some economists believe that consumer habits are changing for more healthier and responsible methods and magnitude of consumerism. The sociology department of Barry University in Florida however refute economist claims that global economic slumps of recent years will promote the ‘end of consumerism’ and a ‘new age of frugality’. Their paper suggests that if global citizens truly want to progress past the market culture that has contributed to the depletion of critical natural resources and human rights abuses, global populations will require more than changing a few behavioural adjustments associated with

spending less. The paper makes strong emphasis on the notion that insatiable consumption has become a global addiction. Their solutions to the problem are as aggressive as their stance: “a paradigmatic shift that breaks completed from deep-seated values, habits, and structures associated with neoliberal capitalism”.

Of the three factors environmentalists often point to as responsible for environmental pollution — population, technology, and consumption — consumption seems to get the least attention.

One reason, no doubt, is that it may be the most difficult to change; our consumption patterns are so much a part of our lives that to change them would require a massive cultural overhaul, not to mention severe economic dislocation. A drop in demand for products, as economists note, brings on economic recession or even depression, along with massive unemployment.

It has also been rooted into our culture and psychology for decades. William James in 1890 wrote: “Our fame, our children, the works of our hands, may be as dear to us as our bodies are, and arouse the same feelings and the same acts of reprisal if attacked. ... a man’s Self is the sum total of all that he can call his, not only his body and his psychic powers, but his clothes, and his house, his wife and children, his ancestors and friends, his reputation and works, his lands, and yacht and bank-account. All these things give him the same emotions. If they wax and prosper, he feels triumphant; if they dwindle and die away, he feels cast down.”

Ethical Consumption

It may seem bleak, but surprisingly, the future is not bleak. Whilst business may want to protect their established companies, competition is always growing, and a new breed of business men and women are merging through the fog of industry. Only this year Elon Musk, the brain behind SpaceX, Tesla and SolarCity, released the new Tesla Model 3. The car that lives up to the looks of James Bond is a ‘power-house’ of energy-efficient fuel. The Toyota Mirai is another worthy competitor that uses hydrogen and emits nothing but water.

The Edge office by PLP Architecture in Amsterdam has received global praise and wards for a building designed to utilise natural light, and a gym configured and engineered to allow its employees to be healthy and also contribute to their building’s energy grid, whilst also flushing its toilets with rainwater; amongst its many other consumer-conscious choices.

Pictured above ( Tesla Model 3 ) below ( The Edge Office designed by PLP Architecture )

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Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy S%!T we don’t need”

With multiple perspectives on the topic, the key to tackling this issue requires evolving past the black-and-white model which many economists and marketing strategists argue for. As shown, it is possible for companies to prosper in an ethical and sustainable market.

Consumerism, as stated at the beginning of the article isn’t inherently bad. Rather, it comes down to education- understanding your consumption patterns and making conscious efforts to improve these. Mahatma Gandhi believed “earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs but not every man’s greed”.

It requires rejecting the excessive marketing pressure that companies will force and give rationale thought to quality, need and morality over quantity, greed and popularity. Author Chuck Palahniuk highlights this in his novel Fight Club- “Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy **** we don’t need”. Having a forward-thinking

mindset will help people exemplify German philosopher Immanuel Kant’s statement “we are not rich by what we possess but by what we can do without”.

Education and action are not required at the individual level alone, but also at the corporate level- to advocate for sustainable and ethical changes to the products produced and the market strategies that are implemented. Both consumer and industry need to take responsibility and both should support one another to do so. With a far greater ethical approach from our global producers and consumers, we may see a steep turnaround for not only a better lifestyle, but also an incredible improvement in global health.

From the food we eat to the commodities we use, and the way we absorb our ever-growing world, consumption ultimately falls down to the final and greatest world issue of all- our rights against our responsibilities: what choice will you make? ■

Volunteer Story

Gemma Martland

I’m Gemma and I run a small business, Whole World of Love –hand painted custom made world globes. I started creating these in order to share something with those who also have a love of adventure, travel and for the world in which we live.

I have been fortunate to complete projects for people from all walks of life, a fulfilling occupation as my creations are a way to spread love across the globe.

I am honoured to have helped Project Third World as the work that they strive to do through development of health and education truly empower the world.

I have played a very small role in contributing something to a wonderful charity; I am moved by the work they do and hope that those reading this may follow in their example and become part of the solution to global development. â–

GRILL

GRAHAM HILL Founder of LifeEdited

Interviewed by

CHIRAG LODHIA

Chief Editor and Founder Graham Hill is the founder of LifeEdited, dedicated to helping people design their lives for more happiness with less stuff. When he started the company in 2010, it brought the ideas of his previous project, the eco-blog and vlog TreeHugger.com, into design and architecture. (The TreeHugger team joined the Discovery Communications network as a part of their Planet Green initiative, and Hill now makes appearances on the green-oriented cable channel.)

Before Treehugger, Hill studied architecture and design (his side business is making those cool ceramic Greek coffee

cups). His other company, ExceptionLab, is devoted to creating sustainable prototypes -- think lamps made from recycled blinds and ultramod planters that are also air filters.

In 2009, Graham Hill purchased two apartments in New York City with the express purpose of showing that people could have everything they need using less (and better) stuff and space.

He had big dreams for the small spaces: dinner parties for 12, accommodations for 2 overnight guests, a home office, a home theatre with

digital projector and, befitting his background, it had to have very clean air and be built in an environmentally responsible manner.

To make this dream a reality, the web-savvy Mr. Hill called on the crowd-sourcing platform Jovoto and marketing firm Mutopo to launch a competition to design the first space (dubbed LifeEdited 1, or LE1). From this, LifeEdited was born. For a long time, Graham has been a global ambassador for sustainable consumption and environmental consciousness, and has provided several Ted Talks.

LifeEdited shows we can live large in small spaces. By applying smart concepts and technology, you can have a compelling, fulfilling life that allows you to live within your means financially and environmentally. Graham Hill shows how this can be done with his own NYC

apartment, with over 1,000 square feet of functionality in only 420. They are also showcasing products and spaces as well as giving tips on how you can have more time, money and happiness with less stuff, less space and less waste.

Start Interview Where does your drive to be a vegetarian come from?

I am actually not a full vegetarian, though I try to moderate my consumption.

If there were no negative implications for meat consumption, I’d probably eat it at every meal. But that’s just not the case. Meat production has a huge carbon footprint and a great deal of livestock must endure awful conditions before slaughter. What I try to do is limit consumption and when I do eat it, get meat from responsible sources. Meat consumption has been linked to heart disease, cancer and even Alzheimer’s disease.

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What motivated you to start a new organisation?

I think LIfeEdited is a continuation of Treehugger in many ways. It was a physical manifestation of the values Treehugger espoused: resource conservation, smart and beautiful design, high tech. I didn’t know of anyone doing anything like it, nor, frankly am I confident I could work with someone if they did. I’m a bit right brained and like to follow my whims, which is harder to do with more established organization.

How much of an impact do you believe the media has on the viewpoints and opinions of society and how important is it for media outlets to be ethical and responsible for giving a balanced (both-sided) view on global issues?

I think the media has a huge influence on how people think. It’s one of the main reasons why I felt Treehugger was so important. Change the culture, change the world. I do think influence flows both ways: media shapes opinions, but opinions also shape media. What’s always excited me about being a part of the media’s conversations is helping people see something they’ve never seen before. In this way, it’s critical to be responsible and not BS people.

What was the inspiration to sell TreeHugger and start the new project: Exception Lab? I love starting stuff, building ideas into viable businesses, so when I had the chance to sell Treehugger, I took it. I had a bunch of ideas brewing, including LifeEdited, and it seemed like a great opportunity to follow through on them as it proved to be.

we’re no happier now...

In the current global economy, how can businesses, particularly small businesses struggling to survive against large corporations be successful and be environmentally and socially progressive?

With Exceptionlab, we focused on making one product and making it the highest quality and best price we can. I think by limiting the scope of your small business, you become a specialist--something that’s tough for a large corporation to do.

For many decades, the “American Dream”, which has slowly become an “International Dream” has developed into a notion of living in a big house, with nice cars, nice furniture and, essentially, own as much as possible.

Where do you see the trouble with these aspirations?

than we were 60 years ago

I think the troubles are obvious. The planet is on the brink of environmental catastrophe, all driven by humans’ insatiable appetite for material resources.

Despite this ravaging of the planet, we’re no happier now than we were 60 years ago, following WWII when our hyperconsumption really took off.

To some it would seem the more you own, the more you have, the more freedom and better quality of life you will have. Why do you disagree with this?

We only have 24 hours in the day. We have a choice as to what we’re going to focus on.

Our space and possessions require attention, which is time really. So the question in life is “what are we going to spend our time doing?”

Listen, if lots of buying and maintaining lots of stuff makes you happy, then you should spend your days doing that (leaving aside the environmental ramifications of doing so). But for most of us, things like doing good work, relationships and having amazing experiences are the things that make us most fulfilled.

Societies have had within its culture for so long the idea to “go big” with housing, personal materials and more. How do you break through these long-held mentalities?

It’s only been recently that people have been able to go big. In the past, technology and manufacturing output only allowed the average person to only go so big. So in a way, going compact is going back to the way things were for millennia. I like to appeal to logic, asking the simple questions: What do you use and need to live a happy, healthy life?

When most people answer that question, they realize they don’t need that much.

Graham providing a TedTalk

Excessive consumption comes in many forms and it almost seems like we are consuming all the time, making it difficult to be consciously aware of consumption all the time. What are your main tips to people for being able to control their consumption in all aspects of life and go from living the ‘big’ life to living the ‘better’ life with ease?

Having a small space helps a lot. As the old saying goes, “nature abhors a vacuum.” When we have a large homes, we tend to fill them.

Small spaces make people more conscious of their consumption. I think pausing and reflecting before we consume is a great idea. The world is begging us to buy, and buy right now.

Usually, if we pause before we do something-going for an extra serving of dinner, buying a new TV, going for a drive instead of biking somewhere--we find there’s a simpler way of doing things than the way our impulses might dictate. ■

Global Reporter | Great Britain

Beena Nadeem

-Global Reporter- Beena Hammond, Great Britain TOXIC

The

To O c X i I C x T

High Street Did you know by upgrading your latest phone you could be fueling a civil war in Congo? By drinking the coffee you do, you could be contributing to the enslavement of children in the Cote D’Ivoire, while the catwalk collections of Milan, Paris and London only eclipse the degradation and human right violations in the sweatshops of India.

Some of the worst human rights violations – such as child labor and enforced slavery still exist in the world, and what’s more – much of it is fueled by our need to consume.

Accord in it is e g to Globa stimate l Slav ery In d that worldw dex 3 id 6 slavery e are trappe million peo , ple d .I India r n terms of a in modern d bsolute emains ay n estima ted 1 top of the li umbers, st with 4. people , follo 29 million an w then e e Pakista d by China nslaved n (2.0 Uzbek (3.24m istan 6m), ), n (1 (1.05m e ): toge .2m,), and wcomer th moder Russ n slave er total 61% of thos ia ry. e in Many o childre f those e n work nslave d inc ing in throug lud coffee h to m p ines to lantatio e used in ns, extract more, our smartph m a t e rials on m funded uch of our es. And wha t’s b c countr y debt. In t onsumption he UK y of 6 4 milli alone is Cards o n – a A p in 200 ssociation re eople, the U 5 incre v K ealed as £566 b s illion in ing from £27 pending 0 billio 2014. n to Under th for Bu e United Na siness tio and H ns Framew busine o uman ss Rights rk respec es have a , t, prote all respon ct s rights of indiv and remedy ibility to th id impact ed by uals and co e human m practic munitie their e, s than an this transla operations. tes to In u litt continu nregulated fa rce as c le more e to v iola om next to imposs te somethin panies ible to g that police. is

"36 mi llion people worldw ide are tra pped in modern day slavery "

Policing becomes difficult as supply chains get blurred as products become more complex in their creation. Add poor monitoring to this, which means accountability gets lost. It is this that leaves people susceptible to exploitation. When no responsibility is taken to protect workers’ rights, there’s nothing to ensure items can be traced back to ethical sources. Even when multinationals like Apple come clean: In 2014 it admitted to using slave and child labour in 451 of its Chinese factories – there are plenty of others to take its place.

In 2012, China’s human rights NGO, Labour Watch, released a report, which widely showed the use of child labourers under the age of 14 for a company, which ultimately supplies Samsung. In 2015, the Financial Times newspaper reported that in South Korea, suicides, deaths and illnesses linked to Samsung factories sparked protests outside its headquarters in Seoul. Samsung is one of thousands.

And we may know a little about their plight. We know about the garment workers in sweatshops. We possibly knew about Apple. Yet consumerism remains a conundrum. Brands give us kudos. They become aspirational – endorsed by models, footballers and pop stars: we can be taken on a journey of apotheosis, where cars can fill a spiritual void and perfumes make us unbelievably alluring. Our smartphones become extensions of our personalities: those with an iPhone and those without.

Child Labour in Bangladesh

"Almost everyone has a mobile phone but most consumers don't know that a key component in the manufacturing of mobile phones is tantalum: an element that is mined in the Congo, where there is civil war. Revenues derived from that … end up funding weapons for rebel groups. So our consumption indirectly supports war," says Professor Manfred Lenzen, Director of the Integrated Sustainability Analysis Research Group (ISA) at the University of Sydney's School of Physics.

It is in fact these mines, which have constant abuses, child labour and human rights violations where children often suffocate or die of exhaustion. Congo is just one example – but there are plenty of others – such as Gold mining in Mali, where safety is never paramount.

Just last month seven workers Trapped in the Rubble

Rana Plaza Post-Collapse

Rana Plaza Pre-Collapse

died in a landslide at an open mine at a Katanga mining company for copper and cobalt. The company is 75 per cent owned by Swiss mining giant Glencore.

Then there’s fashion. As we once a year coo over the latest cutting-edge collections, which hide the grim reality facing the people who make the clothes on our high streets. In sweatshops across the globe, notably Cambodia, India and Thailand, millions of garment workers, mainly women, struggle to survive on poverty wages and provide for their children. They are forced to work 14-hour days in appalling conditions.

And as the spotlight is on some following major disasters such as the one three years ago: the deadly Rana Plaza collapse that killed over 1,100 garment workers who were sewing clothes for Benetton, Primark, Matalan, Mango and others. It took heavy international pressure before these companies set up the Rana Plaza Donors Trust Fund and only recently met its $30 million to provide compensation to victims and their families. Then in December last year, a court ordered the arrest of 24 people and the seizure of their assets after they failed to turn up to face murder charges.

Thulsi Narayanasamy, international programme officer at charity ‘War on Want’, describes a recent visit to Bangladesh: “I met with female garment workers who want unions but are often reported as being verbally and physically harassed by gangs of men employed by factories to intimidate them after their shifts”.

She adds: “Of course, there are existing national and international laws – more accountability and so on, but they are not enforced.

Companies flout these with impunity, profits dictate over morality and profit margins are created through exploitation.

There is no decent living wage, decent working environments, safe conditions, schooling rights and conditions for these people.”

The lives of people continue to be jeopardized according to the Clean Clothes Campaign, which recently reported continued safety violations in Indian factories making clothes for JC Penny, Walmart and Marks and Spencer. While members of a non-government regulated unions were recently sacked in Shenzen, China and in Japan workers in a Mizuno factory were sacked for demonstrating for a better wage.

Perhaps one of the worst assaults on children came from Thailand. The industry that produces our counterfeit handbags is a multibillionpound business, according to Dana Thomas, the author of

Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster. Thomas spends most of her time investigating the counterfeit culture of handbags and other designer goods; she has also investigated the world counterfeit market as a whole and estimates it is worth about $600 billion. This trade is known for using mostly slave labour, often children, and the profits are often used to support all kinds of criminal ventures.

She quotes a story she saw during a Thai police raid, which used small children to make fake designer handbags for Western consumers. The owners became so vexed with constant pleas from the children to go and play outside that they broke the children’s legs and then tied them to their thighs so that they would never heal again, ensuring that the children would never walk again.

Yet we continue to waste.

According to UK children’s charity Barnardo’s recent survey of 1,500 UK women, it found the majority wore only a piece of clothing three times before discarding it. Cheap high street clothes, produced in slave labour conditions, mean few get recycled. Most end up as rags for mattress stuffing.

The UK exports more used clothing to developing world markets —$481m or roughly 351m kilograms worth in 2014 according to United Nations statistics division, than any other country besides the US. Over Easter, no doubt many of us have seen a glut of chocolate eggs. Sadly, the children used

to harvest the coco beans are often younger than the kids who end up eating it. Much chocolate has been painfully produced using child slave labour. Child labourers in Cote d’Ivoire are kept off school as their families need help on the farms. They routinely work 12-hour days, to supply companies, which purchase coco from the region. Many of these kids are abducted from poor countries such as Mali: Some are sold by poverty stricken families for as little as $30. A lawsuit filed in October 2015 against The Hershey Company, Nestlé, and Mars inc., alleges that some of the world’s largest chocolate makers are knowingly using child labour in Africa.

The American chocolate industry has long been accused of such offenses, and a recent lawsuit demanding not only damages but also plaintiffs also want packaging of the chocolate to mention that child slaves were involved. All three lawsuits, filed by lawyers Hagen’s Berman Sobol Shapiro, claim the candy giants "turn a blind eye" to human rights abuses by cocoa suppliers in West Africa, while falsely portraying themselves as socially and ethically responsible.

The lawsuit cites an ongoing Tulane University Study, financed by the US Department of Labor, which estimates more than 4,000 children are forced to produce cocoa on Ivory Coast plantations.

Factory Workers / Japan

A Fishing Village in Thailand

Then there’s the beloved accompaniment to chocolate which our high streets are crammed with. Our relationship with coffee drinking is almost obsessive. Yet many of us are unaware that the beans can be extracted under conditions of forced child enslavement. Two of the world’s biggest coffee companies, Nestle and Jacobs Douwe Egberts admit that the beans they use from their Brazilian plantations may have used slave labour, according to research centre Danwatch. In its recent report, Bitter Coffee, Danwatch says the people involved in producing the beans are said to work for little or no pay and forced to live on rubbish heaps and drink water alongside animals.

Brazil is the biggest exporter of coffee accounting for one third of the global market.

It is here where the supply chains become the most abstruse. But it begs the question, if some coffee are labelled Fair Trade, and supply chains can be traced as ethical, why can’t others?

The likes of Starbucks and Illy – which also source beans from Brazil – have said they know the names of all their supplies, meaning they can avoid “blacklisted” plantations.

Nestlé, has also been in the spotlight again, this time in November 2015 for producing cat food using ingredients sourced from slaves: namely seafood sourced from Thailand.

Since then, it has introduced a tractability programme but has yet to report on its impact or set goals for reducing the impact.

A Fishing Village in Thailand

In October 2015, the European Commission threatened to effectively ban imports of fisheries’ products from Thailand unless things were cleaned up. Testimonials from survivors, which appeared in a Guardian investigation in the summer of 2015 which revealed the dismal exploitation of thousands of stateless Rohingya boat people. Here girls where being continuously raped upon vessels crammed with slave labourers.

It is unlikely that our demand for products will diminish, whether they are ethically produced or not. What we should highlight are those pioneers. Those organisations, which outside Fair Trade, are striving to create ethical consumables outside of all the odds.

For consumables like smartphones, it is going to be much more difficult than say, clothing. Though, bear in mind, even in those factories where checks are made – those factories may outsource work to non-ethical factories were child labor is rife, especially in times of high demand. Still, accountability and more so, the spotlight has been shone on these organizations for longer meaning many high street retailers have had to make more ethical decisions about their supply chains.

For smartphones though, which use around 15, 000 components produced in different factories around the world and using 40 different minerals which can be mined in areas rife with armed groups who control the mines – things are that little bit harder.

Common Example of Child Labour

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A report by Global Witness and Amnesty International published in April 2015 said that out of 100 companies sourcing minerals form the DR Congo, 79 failed to report their supply chains properly. On top of all of this, audits are patchy.

In an interview with Quartz magazine, CEO of Fairphone, said: “The biggest impact we would like to have is creating change in economic thinking and I believe it starts with how consumers think. If we can change the way consumerism is now, and consumption in general, that is where the big gain is.�

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Nathalie Bonney

Obesity is becoming one of the fastest rising and largest health conditions globally - but can we do anything to stop it?

Global Reporter | Great Britain

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"Obesity kills 5% of the world population a year now" Much like the subconscious postChristmas weight pile on, which has us asking ‘why can’t I do my jeans up?’ - failing to connect the breakfasts of candy and lunches that consist of more cheese than cracker, obesity is a growing health epidemic that we’ve allowed to creep on us. Since 1980, worldwide obesity has more than doubled according to World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates. More than 1.9 billion adults were overweight in 2014 - and of this 600 million were obese, the organisation also reports.

Perhaps most staggeringly more of the world’s population now live in countries where obesity and being overweight is a bigger killer than being underweight. Obesity kills 5% of the world population a year now, according to McKInsey’s insights. It’s time to step away from the cheese.

With the clean eating phenomenon taking hold (did you see Beyonce’s Kale sweatshirt?) it can be difficult to believe we aren’t at least making progress in the global battle against fat. But while many of us are wising up to the need to eat better we still need educating on how to eat less.

The first and most obvious reason we are putting on weight as a planet is down to the fact we are eating a lot more. As Morgan Spurlock’s 2004 documentary film Super Size Me demonstrated, when a one-litre coke* is classed as a one-person drink you know something is up.

The 42 ounce size soft drinks from MacDonald’s Super Size menu were removed following the documentary’s airing.

Bagels today for example count as at least three portions of bread but we’ll still probably class a single bagel as the equivalent of two slices of bread - or one portion. Eating two slices of pizza today equates to 850 calories, compared to 500 calories 20 years ago; a takeaway coffee totted up just 40 calories two decades ago but now counts for as many as 330, according to statistics from America’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s (NHLBI).

A Rutger’s University study on portion distortion found that people would pour themselves 20% more cornflakes and 30% more milk than 20 years ago.

Carol Byrd-Bredbenner, a professor of nutrition at Rutgers and a co-author of the study, said one of the reasons we serve ourselves bigger portions is down to bigger cups and plates - we simply fill them up.

"Plate size, bowl size, cup size are very deceptive.

They can't estimate the amount of food in a dish and it makes it even more difficult when the dish is deeper or bigger."

A study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine backs up Rutger’s findings.

When people were given larger bowls and spoons they served themselves larger portions of ice cream, which they would in general finish.

Cornell University scientists meanwhile analysed recipes from the Joy of Cooking since it first appeared in 1936 and found that the average number of calories per serving had jumped 63% in the past 70 years.

But as well as eating more in general we are also eating a lot more secret sugars. British chef and campaigner Jamie Oliver has been lobbying the UK government in recent years to apply a sugar tax on sugary food and drinks to put shoppers off buying them.

In the UK government’s latest budget Chancellor George Osborne announced that they would be doing just that with a levy on soft drinks. An 18p/litre levy will be applied to drinks that contain 5-8g sugar (between 1-2 teaspoons). Fizzy drinks that contain over 8g sugar per litre will be hit with a 24p levy. After the announcement chef Oliver said he was ‘delighted’: “The tax will generate half a billion pounds that will go straight into <English> schools, invested into sports and breakfast clubs. I believe that it will reduce consumption, as it has done in other countries.”

It’s not just soft drinks that are the guilty culprits however; over processed foods such as white bread, ready meals and even pasta sauces can be packed with sugar, which acts as a flavour enhancer but also a cheap preservative giving these food items longer shelf lives.

It would be overly simplistic to claim that it’s only lower economy families that buy convenience food; however, there is certainly a correlation

between obesity and low-income demographics.

The WHO says obesity is particularly prevalent in lower-economy urban populations where many families now face a ‘double-burden’ of disease: under-nutrition now co-exists next to obesity.

Lower income families are forced to buy affordable foods, which are often high in salt and sugar and low on nutritious value. It’s no surprise then that the rate of increase of childhood overweight and obesity is 30% higher than in developing countries, according to the WHO. Childhood obesity remains one of the WHO’s biggest concerns: overweight or obese children are also more at risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, asthma and even certain types of cancer.

In England alone these associated health problems could cost the National Health Service £5 billion a year. There’s a certain irony in the fact that a diet and lifestyle of convenience and affordability is ultimately costing governments across the globe billions in care and treatment costs.

Enlgish Chef Jamie Oliver

“Meat was out of the question . We were seeing a lot of illnesses in people because of the lack of nutrients they were eating and workers weren’t able to farm because of lack of energy.”

Another unfortunate paradox is that while we as a planet are consuming more - we are also throwing away more too: it’s estimated we bin 1.6 billion tonnes of food a year globally - and of this, 1.3 billion tonnes are still edible according to the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation.

These statistics become even more unsettling when you realise that while obesity levels and the amount of food we throw out both climb, there are still people in the world who don’t even have enough to eat three meals a day.

Julio Mercado Cantilla, 57, is a small-hold banana farmer in Columbia: before selling Fair Trade bananas him and his family were forced to eat just one meal a day during what he calls the lean months - periods that could last three to four months a year. During that time Julio and his large family, of eight adult children and 14 grandchildren, would eat little more than pasta with banana to sustain them.

“Meat was out of the question. We were seeing a lot of illnesses in people because of the lack of nutrients they were eating and workers weren’t able to farm because of lack of energy.”

Since the group of smallholders in Julio’s town were able to sell some of their bananas fair trade working conditions and diets have improved significantly.

Julio says: “Now we eat three times a day and we have our own animals - if we want chicken we have them.”

Fair Trade serves as a reminder that when we choose to be more conscious about the food we buy the effects are far reaching - but buying ethically sold bananas in itself has no direct impact on the globesity epidemic. However, at a time when convenient and cheap are the adjectives of choice for the food we buy, we can learn from the Fair Trade principle - where we make a conscious decision about we buy.

There is no quick fix to halting obesity and a sugar tax or smaller portion sizes alone are not going to solve the problem - likewise addressing physical inactivity, which in an extensive European medical study published in the American journal of Clinical Nutrition proved to be, in theory, as responsible for two times as many deaths as a high BMI. The system as a whole and how we consume food has got to change - otherwise in another 30 years the next generation won’t be joking about the extra cheese everyone ate - they’ll be wondering how the previous generation were able to just ignore an epidemic costing millions of lives. ■

ALLES

Feature Interview Dr Alessandro Demaio co-founder of NCDFREE

Dr Alessandro Demaio trained and worked as a medical doctor at The Alfred Hospital in Australia. While practising as a doctor he completed a Masters in Public Health including fieldwork in Cambodia to develop and evaluate a community-based, culturally appropriate health intervention for noncommunicable diseases, particularly diabetes.

In his pro bono work, Dr Demaio co-founded NCDFREE, a global social movement against noncommunicable diseases using social media, short film and leadership events â&#x20AC;&#x201C; reaching more than 2.5 million people in its first 18 months. Then, in 2015, he founded festival21, assembling and leading a team of knowledge leaders in staging a massive and unprecedented, free celebration of community, food, culture and future in his hometown Melbourne.

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Alessandro’s rise to becoming a Medical Officer for the World Health Organization started at a very young age. On paper, his achievements are impressive; however it was achieved through consistent progression in his fields, hard work and taking opportunities that were came throughout his life that has led him to where he is today.

Over to Sandro…

I was born and raised in Melbourne, Australia. My father is a general practitioner and mother is an occupational therapist, which gave me a strong source of medical inspiration whilst also being in a household that is interested in health, healthcare and science. During high school I volunteered with St John’s Ambulance and worked in first aid for local events and youth events. I was the leader of a local unit of cadets, and after finishing school, led the Australian state of Victoria’s cadets for all universities and schools.

I started my career with a degree in medicine at Monash University but I became very interested in public health through a scholarship scheme, in which I spent 2 weeks every year in a remote region of Australia near a place called Mt Isa in Queensland, helping to improve Indigenous Australians’ health. I witnessed a huge level of inequality, but also for the first time, I realised the burden of non-communicable diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity, along with a disparity in epidemiology, burden of disease and access to healthcare and treatment. I felt I was in a system that was built to treat diseases, but not prevent them, despite the vast majority of diseases that we were seeing actually being preventable.

'I felt I was in a syste m tha t was buil t to trea t diseases, but not prevent t hem'

WHO World Health Organisation

I suppose my passion for health comes from a mixture of being involved in volunteering, being involved in the community, being exposed to health and healthcare and the incredible honour and privilege I had to help people and relieve suffering, which sounds clichĂŠ, but itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s certainly something I really enjoy and drove me in the direction of medicine and where I am today.

I was also heavily involved in student politics within the Asian region. I won a scholarship to attend a Hong Kong conference with the Asian Medical Studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Association. I found it fascinating to work with students from different cultures on public health issues.

This public health conference focused on cancer and cancer prevention. In my element, I started talking and discussing topics with students, and by the end of the conference I

was asked to join the board as the Director of Research for one year. I then became Board President for a year and had to run seven conferences around Asia. This all sparked a deep interest in international health within me.

I then completed an internship with the WHO with the then Coordinator of Health Promotion, Gauden Galea. When I started my internship, I realised my interest was not just in the hospital as a clinician, so I started a Masters of Public Health whilst being a medical intern at the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne. Completing both together was intense but a great experience. I ended up in Cambodia doing a research project on community intervention that was started during my time with the WHO.

Whilst gaining experience as a medical professional and working as a doctor in Melbourne’s public hospital sector, it was through research and study that Alessandro realised the significant gaps in holistic health, and found his calling at the World Health Organization.

In the last year of my PhD my mind started questioning “how do we communicate the issue?” as non-communicable diseases are the leading causes of death which kills more people than tuberculosis, malaria and Ebola combined, and yet people are not talking about them. My brother and I decided to launch NCDFREE: a global social movement committed to ending preventable deaths from non-communicable diseases. I then spent the next 2 years teaching and doing research for the project in Mongolia whilst growing NCDFREE.

Whilst Alessandro has achieved much in his professional career, he believes that there are other ways to view achievement other than just professions, titles and degrees.

I think everyone achieves a lot when they look back at, say 8 years of their life. I think people have a lot to show for it. My life has definitely

Most of last year, I spent working on festival21 and helping to develop and build up the EAT Initiative – a new multistate level platform in Scandinavia which aims to connect climate change, food systems and health through a forum of high level leaders, whilst also being a think-tank and policy and research platform.

I spent time between Boston, Melbourne and Oslo over the past year managing the two projects.

Finally, six months ago I started my role as a Medical Officer for non-communicable conditions and nutrition with the World Health Organization. My role is to be a focal point for developing normative and technical work around the double-burden of malnutrition and also look at all aspects including biological, immunological and clinical; and also reviewing and implementing the policies and solutions.

been dominated by global health which is what I’m passionate about. Some people are passionate about being a cross-country runner or being a volunteer or have a passion for photography or travel, which are all incredible ways to spend your time as well. I’m just lucky that what I’m passionate about is what I do for a living. It’s been a busy eight years but also been a lot of fun at the same time.

Balancing work and life is difficult for anyone, let alone a World Health Organization Medical Officer; yet this does not stop Alessandro from proactively making a conscious effort to be a role model for balance and wellbeing and sharing his useful tips on how he approaches this.

My work-life balance is something that I am still working on. My work comes in peaks and troughs. There are times when I work 7 days a week, but I love what I do so it doesn’t seem like work. To me it’s been a learning curve. If I’ve learnt anything over the past eighteen months, it’s that life is a marathon, not a sprint, and it’s something that I’m working out how to approach.

I’m striving to ensure that I take weekends off and try to switch off my mind, but when you’re passionate about what you do and it’s addressing deep and fundamental issues, it is hard. I’d imagine, whether you’re a doctor or teacher or someone working in public health, it’s hard at the end of the day to switch off because you’re trying to improve the lives of people around you, and they don’t switch off. Their suffering doesn’t finish on a Friday so it’s hard for me to switch off.

The other life lesson that I’ve learnt is that twenty to thirty-five years of age is the time to be working harder than when you’re, say forty, and you have young kids and you want to be spending time with the family. Right now is the time you can work harder than you might want to in older decades. Hopefully in the next ten years there will be someone who wants to take over and I will have a slightly different role and be able to take time off with a future family.

Overall, having balance is a very tough thing to achieve. It’s not something that comes easily to me, but balancing it with those two approaches is important I feel.

Already a well-established doctor and researcher and founding his own organisation to tackle NCDs around the world, one could not help wonder what motivated him to work for the WHO. I think growing up I have always admired and deeply respected the work of the World Health Organisation. I think it being the chief normative and technical body on health and health systems of the United Nations, being run fundamentally by the health systems of the world as a democratic platform, for democratic leadership in health and with global impact makes it a dream of mine to work here in Geneva. Coming here as an intern in 2008 and seeing the incredible work that people do, along with the incredible nature of the people doing that work gave me an aspiration to come back. I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t think that I would be coming back at this point in my career but an important opportunity came up to serve the international community.

Leaving full-time work as a clinical doctor who spends one-on-one time with patients might lead people to think Alessandro would become out-of-touch with medicine and medical practice; rather, Alessandro explains why his broader approach to his education makes him a much better doctor.

A few years ago I went back to Australia. It was the start of my Post-Doctoral Fellowship, and over the summer I did locum work in an Australian emergency department. I strongly felt that despite not having done clinical medicine for a year, I was a better doctor at that point than when I left; certainly compared to when I was an intern and fresh out of medical school, even though I was working as a doctor fulltime. I think the reason related to the skills and perspective that working in public health and public health policy affords you. You’re not seeing just the outcome and you’re not just overwhelmed by patient-after-patient. You can actually take a step back and ask “what are the deeper systems?” and “what are the deeper structural problems?” whether they are social or economic or in the health systems themselves. You realise these are all fundamental in determining who walks through your door in a clinic. I think that’s an important realisation that’s come from doing public health work. You also get a respect for the complexity of health.

On a very literal level, working with researchers from around the world who are the brightest in their field; you don’t get that level of global exposure and collaboration at the clinical level. At the same time, there are aspects of clinical medicine that I miss, such as continuity with a patient and being able to help them tangibly. In my new role, if we achieve policy changes, we might not see the true benefits until ten years’ time. It’s very powerful to be able to treat a patient who walks into your clinic and send a patient home on the same day. That’s a part of medicine I definitely miss.

Healthcare often seems like something that just involves ‘curing’ diseases and treating illnesses by doctors and nurses.

As a doctor, Alessandro explains why he is only a very small part of a very big global industry.

It’s so much bigger than just healthcare and even the healthcare system. The major advancements on life expectancy in the 20th century were not made by doctors or even healthcare systems. They were made by engineers and urban designers by creating water and sanitation solutions and changes in nutrition, supply chains and agriculture that allowed people to be fed properly, along with largescale vaccination programs.

You get an appreciation that as a doctor, you have to be very humble. Health in the 21st century will probably be more dictated by economic systems which we live in more than the health systems and level of healthcare.

The world of health is as broad as it is dynamic, and the World Health Organization delegates individuals and groups to tackling various aspects of health. For Alessandro, this meant being able to focus on one of his life’s passions that he feels should be at the forefront of health initiatives globally, and rightfully so.

My position focuses on over-nutrition as well as undernutrition and deficiency in certain types of nutrients, which then follows onto the resulting diseases, and implementing the policies and technical work to try and avoid them from happening in the first place. I’m obviously biased but I think a great challenge that the global community faces is malnutrition in a much bigger context. If you look at the Global Development Goals and how they contextualise malnutrition, they talk about it in all its forms. They talk about the systems that drive and deliver nutrition.

I think if you break it down into those two areas, it would have to be one of the major challenges facing the global community.

For me as an individual, climate change is something that I am deeply concerned about. If you look at the burden of health systems, the numbers are staggering. We have 462 million adults who are underweight worldwide, but at the same time we have two billion who are overweight and obese. That’s an enormous number of people affected by a certain type of malnutrition, linked with the overconsumption of highly processed foods and even to climate change and the economy.

This burden is staggering, which links to childhood obesity, which is going up in every population around the world and linked to non-communicable diseases. At the same time, the systems that deliver our food are a source of concern due to the contributions of greenhouse gases and more. If we can make inroads into nutrition and food in all its forms including obesity and malnutrition, we can improve the lives of a third of the world’s population. At the same time we can also make inroads on other global challenges that we are facing.

Good Food, Good Mood.

For a long time, the issues of poverty and hunger have been at the centre of nutritional global development.

As Alessandro explains, the 21st century brings with it another global nutrition concern of jugular proportions, but also feels that we can learn from the 20th century for ideas on how to tackle present and future global nutrition issues.

The issues of overweight, obesity and childhood obesity are continuing to worsen, but at the same time we are making inroads in undernutrition.

I think we can learn lessons from undernutrition and tackling hunger, and apply it to obesity and look for common policies that address both. I think itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s about having a clear path in mind and working out how you track to get there, supporting and putting mechanisms in place to achieve that and then ensuring an integration between all of them to make sure all involved understand the benefits, whether that be doctors or policymakers. We also need global accountability and achievement of these goals. At a global level, we have rigorous targets and we need to develop strong indicators to track those targets and then work with governments and populations

to achieve those indicators and targets.

Through the Millennium Development Goals it was shown what clear goals and political will can do on a global issue such as malnutrition and undernutrition.

Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve made huge progress over the past twenty years on tackling the number of people going hungry which has also been the result of reduction in poverty and economic development and thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s been a purposeful action by governments, populations and bodies such as the United Nations and World Health Organization. I think there is definitely reason to be optimistic and we need to expand that definition of malnutrition to include all forms and look for common political will and common opportunities to address that wider and interrelated agenda.

An Example fo the Effects of Malnutrition

Global Development has many aspects to consider: from economy to environment, from individual to community; as a person with a unique perspective on these various aspects, Alessandro believes the key to effective global development lies in collaboration.

One of the most important determinants of success and achieving the impact we want, and raise the health status of the world, is collaboration. The WHO is very much a platform that brings together Member States from around the world. Through voices of governments

and actions working together, with the technical support of agency staff, we are able to move the agenda. What is also unique about the WHO is that we have three levels of the organisation, which is the global level, the regional level and then also national offices. Having those three levels and the core function through the World Health Assembly is something that is fundamentally important and crucial to the success of the WHO and its agenda. These agendas are set by the governments of the world and reflect the work, the priorities and need-to-action of those governments.

Aside from taking on traditional career positions, Alessandro is also a successful philanthropist in the truest definition of the word. Through his philanthropic work, he has had great success in developing collaborations, inspiring healthier lifestyle choices and creating global movements at the community level.

Two years ago when we launched NCDFREE, we launched it through the Melbourne Festival of Ideas run through the University of Melbourne. This was a free-thinking public festival for Melbourne that brought people together to rethink who we are and where we are going as a society and the challenges we face. I went along and loved it as an important platform for NCDs to get traction and credibility.

This festival didn’t run in 2015, but I felt 2015 was an important year for Melbourne, Australia and the global community, I thought I’d organise the festival myself Alessandro Speaking at NCDFREE

and try to expand the festival in certain ways by taking it outside of the university sector, making it free and to the public as an open festival, and also include a much wider range of people to cover the full breadth of people from society needed to communicate these issues. This was the birth of festival21. Personally I felt that the three major challenges facing the global community this century are climate change, chronic diseases and NCDs, and a breakdown and connection of people in society; but it’s the very connection and trust and consideration we need to be able to address the first two challenges. We thought about how we would tackle these issues through looking at food and cooking, which Melbourne and the country love. We felt that food is a great way to talk about these issues.

Food is a major risk factor for diseases worldwide and a major driver for climate change. Above all, if you want to bring people together from all different backgrounds to have a conversation about what

they have in common, food is a great way of doing that.

What I get really excited about is the quality of the speakers we were able to provide and the quality of the program, which was worldclass. There are very few platforms that provide a program of the same calibre but also do so for free and be something people can engage with and want to be part of. It really did create a movement.

To be able to create a movement is something that I’m very proud of, especially the marketing group and what they’re able to maintain.

The achievement of having over 4000 people for a free event on a Friday night close to Christmas was a great feeling. I hope that it inspired people to think and talk about the issues and inspire change and inspires other groups such as universities and governments to provide these opportunities to Melbourne as free events. Excuse the pun, but people are hungry for these type of events.

Three aspects of healthcare prominently came up through Alessandroâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s festival21 discussions: equity, education and funding. Whilst speakers engaged with these three individually, Alessandro explains why an equal collaboration of all three aspects is fundamental to healthcare success.

You need to have equity, education and funding together. You need to deliver education programs, food literacy programs; you need to address the inequity and make sure policies are progressive and not regressive and that they are going to address the lowest income groups in high income countries; lower income groups around the world are most affected by these issues. You need funding to be able to run something like NCDFREE and to put on a festival. You need to create funding opportunities such as crowd-funding, but you can also use funding.

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not just a one-way process, and this hold true if you look at progressive pricing policies and the way they work in public health. All three need to be addressed and integrated together. I think it depends on the population you are looking at to determine which of the three needs the most impact, but all three always need to be delivered together.

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With the success of festival21, many people would be gearing up for it to be an annual event, but as Alessandro tells us, weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll have to wait a little longer. 'festival21' is a biennial event which will happen again in 2017. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s run by a group of volunteers with a passion about the issue who have dayjobs. The idea of festival21 is to engage a wider audience and support existing work. We will continue the TED-talk style of work and continue that around Melbourne and Australia. We hope that festival21 will be even bigger in 2017 and engage an even wider audience.

As a person who has gone from the one-on-one healthcare service, to now helping improve the health of the entire world, Alessandro can easily forget to maintain and improve the health of one individual in particular: himself. Fully aware of this, and fully aware of the need for him to be a role model for his own work, Alessandro has set his own personal goals for 2016 along with the world.

My personal health goals are to take up tennis lessons this summer and try to start running more, however the lingering Geneva winter has made it difficult to start. I generally eat very well and love to cook. My food goals are pretty safe but I need to work on the exercise departments.

Personally I am 6 months into a new job and so thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a lot I want to achieve this year in terms of developing new global guidelines on various issues and working with scientists and partners around the world to address and characterise the burden of nutrition-related diseases and NCDs globally.

Globally there are a lot of important milestones to meet. The United Nations just announced a Decade of Action on Nutrition, so we have a lot to do. September will be important for the UN General Assembly as it will be one year on from the SDGs. â&#x2013;