From: odhiambo okecth
In his article appearing in the Daily Nation of today- the 21st Day of June 2012, Prof Jeffrey D Sachs gives a scathing analysis of the paralysis on decision making and action as the embodiments of conferencing.
He quotes the authoritative Scientific Nature Magazine as having summed up the implementation of the 1st Rio Conferencing on the 3 Treaties by giving the following grades;
Climate Change- F meaning, Fail
Biological Diversity- F meaning Fail
Combating Desertification- F meaning Fail.
Kenyans join in a Clean-up Campaign during the World Environment Day celebrations on 5th June 2012
Now, this is real damning, and yet, 20 years down the line, having achieved Zero with the first Rio Conference, travelers and journeymen are once again gathered at Rio to talk about what they talked about 20 years ago.
In his words, Prof Sachs says- Rio has failed to give humanity the language to discuss our own survival. And I absolutely agree with him.
You will all remember that Prof Sachs was the architect of the failed Structural Adjustment Programmes that were then touted as the panacea to our survival in the Third World. The SAPs brought with it poverty of unmitigated proportion to a people who had food in abundance before. We compromised our going to the gardens and tilling our lands for sustainable food outputs just because somebody came along with some experiments in the form of SAPs. And our Government forsook the people and embraced such an experiment.
Before the SAPs were introduced, going to school was a big relief to parents. School fee was only Kshs 20.00 per Term and this was paid at the Chiefs Camp. Once you paid this, you were assured of Text Books in Class and you would be given Exercise Books for Free.
But when SAPs were introduced, journeymen stepped in. Our Education Carriculum was defecated upon and the end result in the mass confusion we still have upto now. Pupils even at Class One are being instructed with books that one might be mistaken are for Graduate Class. I shudder with shame when I take my small Class 2 daughter to school. She has a huge School Bag full of books, yet, when I was in Class Two, I only used to have a Slate.
SAPs messed our Health Institutions and everyone in Kenya is paying dearly for this failed experiment. We used to have Doctors and medicine in our Hospitals before and medication was fairly free. But with the advent of SAPs, we introduced cost sharing and with cost sharing, Doctors started also sharing the little the Government provided with their Private Clinics. The end result is the mess we have found ourselves saddled in.
In all, when Prof Jeffrey D Sachs acknowledges that something is a failure, we must all sit upright and listen, for the man himself has been the epitome of failure for the Third World. he is a Professor of Economics, and I want to believe that SAPs must have been his dissertation. Whoever supervised this works for him enjoins him in condemning the same humanity to unmitigated suffering.
This is why even as I agree with his conclusions, I find in him a paradox of a human being. He concludes thus; Just as the Millenium Development Goals opened our eyes to extreme poverty and promoted unprecedented global action to fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the SDGs- meaning Structural Development Goals- can open the eyes of todays youth to climate change, biodiversity loss and the disaster of desertification.
We have known Countries such as Israel who are not so conference savvy, yet, they have managed to make use of their deserts to full agricultural potentials.
No one will Clean Kenya for us. It must be our responsibility.
Odhiambo T Oketch,
Executive Director,
The Clean Kenya Campaign- TCKC
Tel; 0724 365 557,
Blogspot; http://kcdnkomarockswatch.blogspot.com
The Clean Kenya Campaign; Website-www.kcdnkenya.org