Why is Africa (and the world) still hungry?

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The 2010 Global Hunger Index (GHI) (published 11th Oct 2010) shows that eight out of the nine countries where hunger is increasing are from Sub-Saharan Africa.

Produced by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Welthungerhilfe and Concern Worldwide, the annual index is calculated for 122 developing and transition countries.

This year’s study shows that twenty-nine of them, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, have levels of hunger described as “extremely alarming” or “alarming”.

The study shows that the Democratic Republic of Congo had the biggest increase in hunger levels which rose there by 65%, while Ethiopia, Ghana and Mozambique have all shown an improvement over the last ten years.

Some countries achieved significant absolute progress in improving their GHI. Between the 1990 GHI and the 2010 GHI, Angola, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mozambique, Nicaragua, and Vietnam saw the largest improvements. Original Article

The 2010 Global Hunger Index report reveals that the first 1,000 days of a child’s life – from conception to age two – is critical to tackling global hunger.

According to the report, malnutrition among children under two years of age is one of the biggest challenges to reducing global hunger. It can cause lifelong harm to health, productivity and earning potential. (source: Concern Worldwide)

With the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal to “eradicate extreme poverty and hunger” by 2015, woefully behind schedule and with upwards of 35,000 people – over 30,000 of which are children – dying every single day of the year through starvation, (source: www.starvation.net) we at The Peaceful Planet believe we have the solution to cure the global issues of extreme poverty and hunger with the combination of our Peaceful Economy and Peaceful Diet.

The Peaceful Planet principles may be seen as “radical” – but in the year 2010, isn’t it grossly obscene that tens of thousands of people are still dying needlessly every single day.

A radical change in thinking is needed right NOW to replace the current (corrupt) global monetary system and to the totally inefficient, and cruel, animal-based diet we are consuming, which is damaging to not only the health of humans and non-humans but also to planet Earth itself.

Help us to spread the message that there IS a permanent solution to world hunger and poverty by telling your family and friends about us and by posting about us on Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace etc.

2010 Global Hunger Index Map

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Gary Francione’s Thoughts on Veganism and 2011

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It is the obligation of all who embrace veganism to educate others in creative ways about the fundamental moral truth of not exploiting the vulnerable.

We must all become teachers of nonviolence in our homes, social circles, schools, workplaces, and communities. We start teaching by our own example.

Ethical veganism is nonviolence in action; it is dynamic harmlessness. It requires that we reassess and reject the insidious ideologies of domination that we have been raised to accept as “normal.” A world that moves toward ethical veganism will be a world that moves toward greater peace and justice as a general matter.

If we stop treating animals like animals, we will stop treating other humans like animals.

Let us resolve to stand up against all forms of discrimination (racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, speciesism) and just say no.

Let us resolve to make the world a more peaceful place in 2011 and let us each do our part in that effort. I will continue throughout 2011 to do Commentaries focusing on the various forms of positive, creative, nonviolent, grassroots vegan advocacy that are emerging and developing in many countries and in all sorts of communities. We should all learn from these advocates!

If you are not vegan, go vegan. It’s easy; it’s better for your health and for the planet. But, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do. You will never do anything else in your life as easy and satisfying.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
©2011 Gary L. Francione

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George Clooney’s Hi-Tech Plan To Stop War

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George Clooney has said that his hi-tech attempt to prevent a resumption of civil war in Sudan is “the best use of his celebrity”.

The actor’s pressure group Not On Our Watch is funding a project which uses commercial satellites to monitor any signs of impending conflict.

There is concern that a referendum on Sunday could reopen a decades-old civil war, if the oil-rich south of Sudan votes to split from the north.

The mainly Arab government in Khartoum, which has been accused of genocidal activity in the Darfur region, may resort to arms in the disputed border region.

Clooney says he wants President Omar al Bashir to know that if he uses force against innocent civilians, the world is watching.

“A lot of bad things happen when the lights are turned off, in particular in Sudan, and so we are just trying to turn the floodlight on,” he told Sky News.

“Our big argument is this: we are always late and we always come in and say ‘We didn’t know’, and ‘Had I known I would have done something about Rwanda or Cambodia’.

“But rather than triage this after it has happened, it’s infinitely cheaper and infinitely more effective to do it beforehand.”

In association with the anti-genocide group, Enough Project, the website will allow experts to analyse and record imagery of any signs of aggression or movement of refugees.

It could be used as evidence to indict members of the Khartoum government and toughen the United Nations mandate, allowing peacekeepers to protect citizens from attack.

Clooney says it makes sense to harness the technology.

“You can Google Earth my house any time, and zoom right down onto it. I want people who do really evil acts to enjoy the same level of celebrity that I do.

“They want to be famous, you’re famous now – if it works, it’s worth doing everywhere because it’s infinitely cheaper than taking all these people to refugee camps and paying to keep them alive.”

Sudanese officials called the project “baffling”, saying it “reeks of an ulterior motive”.
But the actor remains defiant.

“To be disliked by a government which has been charged by the international criminal court of crimes against humanity and genocide, is not necessarily a scarlet letter,” he said.

“I don’t feel terribly bad about the government of Sudan being upset. I think they’re concerned by this and I think that’s a good thing. They should be concerned.”

The actor says if the project is successful it could become a model for other global hotspots, using the threat of 21st-century technology to prevent bloodshed previously hidden from view.

“Listen, I don’t know if it will work, I really don’t, but we are going to try,” he said.

Original Article

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The Starch Solution

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John McDougall MD, presentation at the VegSource Healthy Lifestyle Expo 2010.

This truth is simple and is, therefore, easy to explain. You must eat to live. The human diet is based on starches. The more rice, corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and beans you eat, the trimmer and healthier you will be – and with those same food choices you will help save the Planet Earth too.

The Starch Solution. What is it? According to John McDougall MD, it’s the answer to many of the world’s health, hunger and environmental problems.

It’s also the title of a fascinating talk by Dr. McDougall, which we are bringing you below on video. The Starch Solution is about how the human body is adapted to eat a predominately starch-based diet, with fruits and veggies added.

In his talk Dr. McDougall shows how every large successful culture throughout history has flourished on an unprocessed, largely starch-based diet, not a meat-heavy one.

The modern widespread heavy meat diet is relatively new in history, a dangerous experiment in human health with little precedent.

Original Article

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Making The Connection

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“Making the Connection” is a new film which invites you on a journey – together with a chef, a farmer, an MP, an athlete, a dietician, a poet – to explore an exciting lifestyle which combines delicious, healthy food with tackling many of the global challenges facing us today.

Will you make the connection and become part of the solution?

“Making the Connection” is a 30 minute film produced by Environment Films . The DVD is freely available from The Vegan Society for media professionals and public showings. ‘Making the Connection‘ is also online in eight chapters.

Chapter 1: Food

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Teaching Without Borders: Peace Education

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Teachers Without Borders is a non-profit, international organization with a small staff and a membership of over 6,500 in over 180 countries. Their programs are conceived by, led, and developed by local education leaders and supported by a global network of colleagues. The mission of Teachers Without Borders is to advance human welfare through professional development on a global scale.

Vision
At over 59 million, teachers are the largest single group of trained professionals in the world. The evidence is clear: a quality education correlates with dramatic advances in human welfare. Better health. Fewer infant deaths. Cleaner water. Human rights. All children deserve the right to flourish because of great teachers.

Plant-Based Diets are Healthier and May Prevent Cancer

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Prof. Emeritus T. Collin Campbell, nutritional sciences, attempted to dispel myths about the importance of meat and dairy proteins for a healthy diet Thursday, in a talk titled “A Convocation in Nutrition.”

Campbell, co-author of The China Study, and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn of the Cleveland Clinic detailed the scientific evidence for the benefits of plant diets, citing the diet’s positive results for everyone from former President Bill Clinton to those suffering from degenerative diseases.

The two explained that these diets not only minimize the potential risks of developing chronic diseases, but also hold the potential to reverse some of the damage and heal the body even in fairly late stages of degenerative diseases.

Campbell showed the audience of a clip of Clinton with Wolf Blitzer on CNN on Sept. 25, where the former president explained that he had lost a considerable amount of weight on a plant-based diet, including a daily protein supplement and the occasional fish meal. Clinton cited Campbell’s The China Study as crucial reading for helping along his weight loss. While Campbell and Esselstyn applauded Clinton for his adamant stance on having “no dairy” in his diet, they suggested that his protein supplement was unnecessary and the occasional fish could be just as harmful as the occasional cigarette.

In his talk, Campbell explained that the entrenched beliefs in science when he was younger were that meat-based protein was an essential component of any diet. Campbell even fed Filipino children meat in an attempt to eradicate malnutrition in their country while in the early stages of his career.

As Campbell saw studies correlating protein consumption with development of cancer, he began to question the nutritional orthodoxy that based diets around the intake of protein.

“I don’t want you to leave here with the impression that protein is a bad thing,” Campbell noted.

Many of his nutritional studies found that the ideal proportion of protein consumption in one’s diet is approximately 10 percent — any more and instances of cancer development increase dramatically. Campbell also cited studies that linked consumption of dairy with different types of cancer.

In addition to the different links between protein and cancer development, other studies seemed to show that “cancer is a geographically localized disease,” Campbell said, where the geographical regions that report higher instances of cancer are those that have diets high in protein.

Campbell summed up by saying that nutrition is holistic, a concept which is “anathema” to most scientists’ method. He noted that he often fell victim to the rigid scientific mentality himself, looking for a single causal force for cancer when in fact, there are multiple mechanisms.

“We missed the big story,” Campbell said about his previous way of conducting scientific research and one that he believes is still prominent today.

Dr. Esselstyn began his lecture by deriding the current medical system’s tendency to resort to “quick fixs” like surgery or medication to reverse underlying conditions, explaining that plant diets have been shown to heal such complicated illnesses as heart disease and coronary artery disease.

“Nothing with a mother. Nothing with a face,” Esselstyn said as he rattled off a list of foods to avoid and foods to include in an ideal diet. Esselstyn noted oil, fish, fowl, meat, dairy and caffeinated coffee as common foods to avoid.

“The only people who really don’t want to see me succeed … is the government, the USDA. Every five years they make a wonderful pyramid that is laden with foods that guarantee that millions of Americans will perish,” Esselstyn said.

As anecdotal evidence of the virtues of plant-based diets for protein consumption, Esselstyn cited the example of Joe Rollino, the legendary Coney Island strong man. Esselstyn said Rollino only ate a plant-based diet his entire life. Up until earlier this year when he was killed by a delivery van, Rollino was still living healthy at 103 years old.

Esselstyn recommended going “cold turkey” when switching to a completely plant-based diet.

Original Article

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Peace Education Without Borders

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Stephanie Knox Cubbon gives some historical background and theoretical context to the Dr. Hungwa Memorial Peace Education Program, an important new initiaive to build a culture of peace through education and professional training.

A Peace Education Program Begins
When sectarian violence erupted in the Jos region of Nigeria in 2010, Raphael Ogar Oko was looking for peaceful solutions. Mr. Oko, a veteran educator and Teachers Without Borders Country Coordinator, had witnessed much violence and conflict in his life, having grown up in a family who struggled to survive during the civil war that erupted just after the country gained independence. During his school days in the Niger Delta region, he witnessed unimaginable violence and conflict, and astutely observed the pervasive culture of war all around him – from “Man O War” clubs, to the celebration of warlords as local heroes, to the giant billboard for the National War College that greeted him upon his arrival to Abuja. Wanting to counter this, Mr. Oko dedicated his life to peacebuilding, through his roles as an educator, Ambassador for Peace, and Secretary-General for the Universal Peace Federation.

When violence erupted at a time when the country was preparing to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the end of civil war, it became clear to Mr. Oko that there was a need to intensify efforts to build a culture of peace, to create peaceful communities, and to use resources and technology for peace – and he believed that peace education would be the best way to do this. While some organizations, including the Nigerian army, had started initiatives for peacebuilding, no one seemed to be institutionalizing peacebuilding programs. Mr. Oko decided that peace education would be the most effective way to build a culture of peace, as he sees teachers as best positioned in terms of numbers and ability to influence the hearts and minds of future generations. Furthermore, he saw peace education as a tool to empower teachers with the skills they need to teach their students the knowledge, attitudes, values and skills for peaceful living. To meet this need, as well as the general need for greater professional development opportunities for teachers, he requested that Teachers Without Borders develop a teacher professional development program on peace education.

Teachers Without Borders
Teachers Without Borders (TWB) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to advance human welfare through teacher professional development on a global scale. TWB believes that investing in teachers is one of the most effective, efficient ways to invest in communities, and that through teacher professional development, widespread change can be effected. TWB offers a number of online teacher professional development courses, including The Certificate of Teaching Mastery, and also hosts workshops and conferences for teachers all over the world. TWB also emphasizes that teachers learn best from one another, and the organization strives to bring teachers together, both in person and online, in learning communities.

The Teachers Without Borders Teacher Professional Development Program on Peace Education, which evolved from Mr. Oko’s request, seeks to bring peace education to a global audience by providing professional development to teachers. The program aims to provide teachers with the knowledge, skills, and tools that they need to bring peace education to their classrooms, schools, and communities, equipping their students to be agents of peaceful change. One teacher has the potential to impact dozens of students, creating a ripple effect of peaceful transformation throughout the school, community, and ultimately, the world.

What is Peace Education?
But what is peace education? As peace education is a broad field, it can be hard to define. Very simply, peace education aims to provide learners with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values necessary to end violence and injustice and promote a culture of peace.

Peace education can manifest itself in many forms. It is a holistic practice, and attempts to analyze issues from the micro, personal level, to the macro, global level, linking the past to the present and future. Fields such as human rights education, multicultural education, global citizenship education, and conflict resolution education are all considered to be part of the field of peace education. Peace education is highly contextual, and while it will appear differently in different regions, the essence is the same. Peace is peace, no matter where you are.

Perhaps more important than the content of peace education is the pedagogy, or teaching methods, through which education is delivered. One of the most influential philosophers in the field is the Brazilian pedagogue Paulo Freire, who critiqued the traditional lecture-based education system, or what he called the “banking system”, in which the teacher is perceived to have all of the knowledge and works to deposit the knowledge in the students’ heads. Freire proposes an alternative to this, which he expounds upon in his 1970 classic Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

Several key principles of Pedagogy of the Oppressed have become key principles in peace education, one of which is reconciling the teacher-student relationship. In the banking system, this relationship is hierarchical, in which the teacher has the power and the students have little to none. To reconcile this imbalanced relationship, teachers and students must develop a horizontal, equitable relationship where both are seen as teachers and learners with valuable knowledge and experience.

How do teachers and students cultivate this relationship? Freire’s answer, and another key peace education principle, is through dialogue. By engaging in a practice of dialogue, where everyone has the opportunity to share and be heard, greater understanding arises. As such, dialogue is the cornerstone of peace education practice. An important aspect of this is asking critical questions.

The development of critical consciousness is another key principle of peace education, which Freire calls “conscientization” (in Portuguese, conscientização). Through cultivating critical consciousness, learners develop an in-depth understanding of the world and its underlying contradictions. A key aspect of this is learning to question one’s own beliefs and where they come from, making self-reflection another essential peace education practice.

From critical consciousness, students must put their learning into action, or what Freire referred to as praxis. Praxis involves moving from the theoretical to the practical, as learners take their knowledge and apply it in real-world situations. Action is a vital step in all peace education efforts, as without practical application in the real world, transformation cannot occur.

Transformation of learners and of the world is the ultimate goal of peace education. We currently live in a culture of war, rife with violence and injustice. Peace education seeks to transform this culture to a culture of peace, where human rights, democratic principles, nonviolence, and compassion prevail. In order for this to occur, there must be a transformative shift in learners. From this place of personal transformation, learners can in turn transform the outer world, in their homes, communities, and the world.

Teachers Without Borders Peace Education Program
The Dr. Hungwa Memorial Peace Education Program seeks to impart these principles so that teachers can then work with their students in creating this transformation. The program is named after the late Dr. Joseph Hungwa, who was the former TWB Country Coordinator in Nigeria and a Millennium Development Ambassador. Dr. Hungwa was a model peace educator and teacher of teachers who dedicated his life to promoting education in his community, region and country. He believed in education and worked hard to eliminate all barriers to education in his community and among his colleagues and kinsmen. Dr. Hungwa played a crucial role in expanding TWB’s programs in Nigeria, and it is largely due to his efforts that the official launch of the Peace Education program will take place there.

The comprehensive program moves from the theoretical to the practical, and begins with the history and definitions of peace education, philosophical underpinnings, and the core concepts in the peace studies field. The program then explores the scope of peace education, reviewing areas such as human rights education and multicultural education. The second half emphasizes practical applications and provides selected activities to give teachers tools that they can immediately implement with their students.

While the course is intended for K-12 teachers (primary and secondary school), the course is useful for teachers of any level, as the lessons and principles are easily adapted, and is likewise useful for anyone who is interested in peace education. In reality, we all can be teachers of peace by leading by example in our everyday lives. However, school teachers have a particularly important role to play in promoting a culture of peace, as teachers serve as role models for children and young adults at a formative phase in their human development. By being role models for peaceful living, and by helping learners to acquire the knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to live peacefully, teachers can play a vital role in the cultural transformation towards a culture of peace.

The online format of this program allows peace education to literally reach across borders. Through the free online service, teachers from different parts of the world can engage in the material and bring peace education to their regions. The TWB website allows teachers to dialogue with one another, and through this program, teachers can exchange ideas about strengths and challenges, share lesson plans and strategies, and overall, build a peace education learning community.

TWB will also be organizing in-person workshops in many regions, the first one to take place in Nigeria in the upcoming months. Through these workshops, TWB intends to reach across the digital divide to teachers who may not yet have access to the internet, while at the same time providing the opportunity to bring teachers together to learn from one another. While TWB sees the value of technology in helping to spread ideas at the global scale, the organization also sees the importance of person-to-person interactions, and views in-person trainings as an important way to promote interpersonal learning exchanges.

Intended Outcomes
Through training teachers, the program intends to have positive impacts on communities at various levels. While the program should result in decreased incidents of violent behaviors such as bullying, the program also aims to promote constructive, holistic peacebuilding. Through peace education, students will develop peaceful communication skills, the abilities to navigate across cultures, conflict resolution skills, and the ability to work cooperatively – all skills that are necessary for peaceful living. Students will also hone their critical thinking skills and be able to understand and dissect complex problems, develop creative solutions, and put the solutions into concrete action. By increasing student involvement and participation through experiential and reflective learning activities, students will be more empowered and overall performance will improve.

When asked about his hopes for the peace education program, Mr. Oko said, “I am looking forward to the peace education programs contributing to making our families, schools and communities become more peaceful and conducive for healthy living…Teachers will become more interested in advancing their professional skills in peacebuilding and more schools will witness a reduction in violence.”

In this time of environmental degradation, violent upheaval and instability, the world needs peace education, from the central Nigeria to southern California and everywhere in between. While our current situation is dire, we have the power to change the trajectory of our society from one that promotes violence and destruction to one that promotes peace and creativity. Peace education helps to prepare individuals to become creative thinkers and problem solvers, so that we may transform our world into one in which peace prevails. As the problems we face are complex and varied, they will require multi-pronged solutions. However, peace education can serve as the framework for solving these problems. Peace education is the path towards a sustainable, just, and thriving future.

Original Article

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World Vegan Day

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The 1st November is World Vegan Day and marks the start of World Vegan Month.

Tell your family & friends about the benefits of a Peaceful Diet for the planet, for humans, and for all animals – for each and every day of the year!

United Nations World Disarmament Week 2010: October 24 to 30

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The following article, about World Disarmament Week 2009 by Rubén Benayas, was published last year and, 12 months on, if this statement by Sergio Duarte (UN Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs) at the recent United Nations 65th General Assembly is anything to go by, it would appear that the United Nations is no further advanced in its quest for nuclear and conventional disarmament:
“If major steps forward in disarmament are postponed indefinitely, if questions persist of compliance with non-proliferation commitments, and if military spending continues to rise while Millennium Development Goals continue to be unmet, then our potential contributions will be correspondingly limited.”

Last year’s article is just as relevant today:

World Disarmament Week: October 24 to 30

Every year the United Nations organises this week to coincide with the anniversary of its founding. The aim is to raise awareness among all of the UN’s member states of the danger posed by the arms race, to propagate the need to put an end to it and to foster a better public understanding of the urgent task of disarmament.

Every year the United Nations celebrates the anniversary of its founding in 1945 during this week. The main goals of Disarmament Week revolve around raising awareness among all of the UN’s member states of the danger posed by the arms race (whether conventional or nuclear armament), propagating the need to put an end to the arms race and fostering a better public understanding of the urgent task of disarmament. It also encourages the reallocation of the economic resources used for arms race to favour economic and social development.

Securing peace and safeguarding international security is the responsibility of all United Nations States through their firm commitment to reducing and subsequently eradicating the main threat to our planet, weapons of mass destructions, more commonly known as nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

The week must be seized upon to adopt political strategies for disarmament and one of these is to invite all of the countries to take part actively through alliances in order to foster a true understanding of the problems related to disarmament, given that over history the arms race has caused huge human loss and great economic waste. The aim is to put an end to war as the way to resolve conflict and to eliminate the use of military force and threat at an international, national and regional level.

However, the disarmament promoted by the United Nations faces some superlative contradictions: the five countries with the right to veto in the Security Council (the USA, Russia, China, France and the UK), own 90 % of the world’s nuclear arsenal and are the world’s main producers and vendors of weapons of all kinds.

FIGURES:

  • In 2008, sixteen major armed conflicts were maintained in fifteen places around the world: Africa: Burundi, Somalia, Sudan • America: Columbia, Peru, USA • Asia: Afghanistan, India, Myanmar, Pakistan, Philippines, Philippines (Mindanao), Sri Lanka. • Middle East: Israel, Iraq, Turkey

  • The main military expenditure budgets in 2008 (in billions of $ – % of the world total armament expenditure): USA 607 – 41.5% / RUSSIA 58.6 – 4% / FRANCE 65.7 – 4.5% / UK 65.7 – 4.5% / CHINA 84.9 – 5.8% / GERMANY 46.8 – 3.2% / JAPAN 46.3 – 3.2% / ITALY 40.6 – 2.8% / SAUDI ARABIA 38.2 – 2.6% / INDIA 30.0 – 2.1%

  • The total world expenditure on armament in 2008 is estimated at 1,226 billion dollars. From 1999 to 2008 expenditure increased by 45%

  • Strategic and non-strategic nuclear warheads deployed around the world (year 2009): 8,392 total – USA: 2,702 / RUSSIA: 4,834 / UK: 160 / FRANCE: 300 / CHINA: 186 / INDIA: 60 to 70 / PAKISTAN: 60 / ISRAEL, 80

According to Rafael de la Rubia, International Coordinator for the World March for Peace and Nonviolence, “this year we have experienced the biggest economic crisis in history and still investment in armament worldwide has continued to increase. The military industry is the worst cancer that afflicts the world”.

Indeed, despite the most far-reaching, severe and long-lived crisis in history, weapons expenditure and provisioning continues to grow in 2009 despite the multiple treaties in force for the control and non-proliferation of nuclear and conventional weapons and conventions of all kinds on human rights, alliances of the civilisations etc.

An enormous business revolves around armament. To date, this lobby has managed to construct and generate a system capable of organising impossible wars, facilitating military encroachments and invasions of territories, sowing fear and distrust of the West among Eastern cultures and religions and creating ‘terrible, evil and cruel’ enemies using ferocious propaganda campaigns. All of this has been done to maintain the spectacular business of the military industry.

There is room for everyone in the armament business. Every country in the world allocates their biggest budgets (heedless to the fact that it is public money they are spending) on defence expenditure. Nobody escapes the arms spiral. It is not just Europe, the USA, China and India that allocate the most resources for security and defence; the impoverished and devastated countries of Latin America, Africa and Asia also allot more to these investments than they do to fighting hunger and poverty or to alleviating the serious problems of access to healthcare and education.

Many experts maintain that for the wars and tensions between territories the economic crisis provides the ideal climate for warmongering. It would be positive for our future evolution if, at this historic time, this terrible marriage between recession and war was broken.

We must hope that the 2009 Disarmament Week has the desired effect of raising awareness among leaders because, among the people of the world, the seeds of peace and nonviolence have already been sown.

Sources: SIPRI Yearbook 2009: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) is an independent international institute for research who works on problems of peace and conflict, in particular arms control and disarmament. It was founded in 1966 to commemorate 150 years of uninterrupted peace in Sweden.

Further reading: SIPRI Yearbook 2010: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security

Original Article by kind permission of Pressenza International Agency

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