Team Email Address (Email will be used for team communication with/by the U.S. Fund for UNICEF): /
Team Members
First Name / Last Name / Email address / Gender (M/F) / School / Organization / Date of Birth (YYYY-MM-DD)Brandon / Araki / / M / The HarkerSchool / 1992-05-18
Vishesh / Jain / / M / The HarkerSchool / 1992-04-05
Connie / Lu / / F / The HarkerSchool / 1992-07-12
Andrew / Zhou / / M / The HarkerSchool / 1992-08-03
2) G8 Summit agenda issues:Focusing on selected G8 agenda topics, describe two ways you would recommend to G8 leaders to solve each problem. Please write up to 300 words to describe two ideas for each topic below.
- The Environment and Climate Change: Describe two ideas for ways G8 countries can achieve sustainable and efficient energy supply, energy consumption reduction and other measures to curb global warming and better protect the integrity of the environment.
Wood-burning stoves, which are used by most of the world’s poor, emit vast quantities of soot and contribute up to 18% of global emissions. Replacing inefficient stoves with efficient ones is a cheap and fast-acting solution to curb global warming; soot falls out of the atmosphere quickly, and efficient stoves now cost only $20 and can reduce emissions by 90-100%. The poor do not use more efficient stoves because they do not know about them, cannot afford them, or do not have access to them. The G8 can solve these problems by promoting and funding programs to provide the poor with affordable stoves and to educate them on the benefits of using efficient stoves, which pollute less and reduce time spent gathering wood. Therefore efficient stoves not only offer the poor immediate benefits in health, safety, and convenience but also promise to dramatically curb global warming.
G8 nations can combat electricity generation’s 37% share of CO2 emissions by subsidizing the Integral Fast Reactor. Nuclear power is the only energy source now ready to entirely replace coal-based energy while also providing emissions-free power worldwide. However, current Light Water Reactors are plagued by inefficiencies, safety concerns, and hazardous waste. IFRs uniquely address these problems by closing the nuclear fuel cycle, mitigating the need for waste disposal and uranium milling and enrichment. An IFR’s unique design allows it to process already-recycled LWR waste as fuel and makes them substantially safer and more secure. Through waste reprocessing, IFRs eliminate the need for environmentally unsound waste depositories like the U.S.’s YuccaMountain facility. Researchers demonstrated that even if its safety systems fail, an IFR would shutdown independently and safely. Making IFRs more affordable will enable countries hesitant about nuclear power to convert with far less concern about meltdowns, security, and proliferation.
- HIV and AIDS: Infectious diseases such as HIV and AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis are a major burden on the health and productivity of people – particularly children - in many low-income countries. Describe two measures to help curb one or more diseases that can be undertaken by G8 leaders.
By recalibrating the Global Fund as well as their national programs to emphasize the training of indigenous traditional healers to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, G8 nations can dramatically improve the treatment of AIDS victims and slow the spread of the epidemic. Though healers are highly influential members of their communities, aid organizations often view them as disreputable nuisances who enforce harmful superstitions and peddle folk remedies. However, they will prove critical in the fight against HIV/AIDS, as they command great influence in their communities: in Africa, it is estimated that healers serve 85% of the population. G8 nations can ensure that these healers play a potent role against AIDS by developing programs to educate them on sanitary techniques, condom use, and safe sexual practices. Healers can greatly aid current AIDS education programs by disseminating this knowledge to their patients and training their peers in modern practices.
Furthermore, G8 countries can curb the debilitating effects of vector-transmitted diseases such as malaria by endorsing the use of DDT as an insecticide. The international taboo against the use of DDT, which has caused millions of preventable deaths, would be greatly eroded with the support of these internationally credible nations. Though environmentalists have historically opposed DDT, its negative effects were primarily due to its widespread agricultural use in the past, not its application as an insecticide. For instance, the country of Guyana could protect its whole population from malaria with the same amount of DDT previously used on 1,000 acres of cotton. As current scientific research supports DDT and indicates that its taboo status is largely unjustified, G8 nations must now send an international signal by advocating its use. This simple step would be sufficient to save millions and help eradicate the pestilence of malaria plaguing many nations.
- Education—A third topic of your choosing: Every year, the leaders at the G8 Summit discuss the world’s most pressing issues, of which there are many. Topics could include the financial crisis, the global food crisis, education, etc. Please identify a global issue you feel is particularly relevant to your team and to young people around the world and describe a response that you think G8 leaders should support.
We have decided to address education because of its ability to bring drastic and lasting change to impoverished communities. Education reduces incidents of crime, malnutrition, and sexually transferred diseases; one year of education increases girls’ future incomes 10-20% and reduces infant mortality by 5-10%. However, in many cultures menstruating girls suffer intense social stigma, and lack of effective menstrual management materials discourages adolescent girls from attending school: in Sub-Saharan Africa, 43% of girls do not attend primary school and 83% do not attend secondary school. The G8 can significantly increase enrollment by providing funds for reusable menstruation cups (RMCs), which allow menstruating girls to attend school without embarrassment. RMCs are preferable to disposable materials because traditional superstitions complicate disposal and proper disposal facilities are not widespread. RMCs can be kept clean through boiling and can be used for several years, thereby providing a sustainable and convenient method of allowing menstruating girls to attend school.
The G8 can also sustain and increase student enrollment by expanding funding for research into food for education (FFE) programs in developing nations. These programs are widely used to increase enrollment in schools; however, the lack of research into their effects is limiting their value. Currently, no authoritative research has determined the exact impact of such programs on student performance, enrollment, and even health. Furthermore, no study has determined conclusively the most cost-effective method of distributing meals; aid organizations do not know if their FFE programs are as effective as possible or even worth the cost. By funding comprehensive and conclusive studies to determine the effects of FFE and to establish which forms and combinations of FFE programs are the most effective in various situations, the G8 will provide aid organizations with the knowledge to cost-effectively expand their FFE programs, increase enrollment, and improve student performance.
3)References: Cite all of the references you used in a bibliographic list (include the websites, newspaper articles, magazine articles, letters, presentations, books, etc. that informed your research).
Works Cited
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Cooper, Ann. “Reinventing the School Lunch.” Technology, Entertainment, and Design. Monterey. Dec. 2007. 1 Apr. 2009 <
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5) Mobilizing others: The Junior 8 Summit is one event in a wider UNICEF strategy to connect and assist communities of young people in their efforts to make the world a better place. If you were able to attend the Summit, how would you inspire other young people to become involved in global issues in your community upon your return?
Upon returning to California, we plan on using the experience, knowledge, and ideas we gain at the J8 Summit to reach out to our community, raise awareness of global issues, and enable others to participate in making change. If we are selected to go to the summit, our strategy to reach out to our peers will begin the moment we are chosen. We will collaborate on a blog and make both joint and individual posts frequently before, during, and after the summit. Our blog will inform our peers of our experience; educate them; and encourage readers to post their own thoughts, feelings, and questions even after the summit is over. Our goal will be to motivate readers to learn more about the G8, UNICEF, and the UN; aid them in making change; and provide them with support to participate in the J8 Summit in 2010. We will also reach out to the community around us. Through SHINES, we will not only tutor local students but also raise awareness about the dire need for education and raise funds for organizations focused on improving education in developing countries. Brandon and Vishesh, founding members of the Biology Club, plan on collaborating with other clubs to inform our peers about the individual measures they can take to reduce their carbon footprints and slow biodiversity loss, such as reducing their meat consumption, eating locally grown foods, and buying only sustainably grown wood products. By informing our peers of their ability to help the climate and preserve biodiversity by making simple yet effective choices, we hope to drastically reduce our community’s carbon footprint. As the Global Outreach and Empowerment club’s first web master, Brandon will be uniquely positioned to use our knowledge gained at the J8 to educate and organize members through the club’s web site, and some of us will run for officer positions so that we can use the ideas we learn at the summit to lead GEO in its campaigns to help the world achieve the MDGs. We will also collaborate with the school’s administration to address the entire student body about our experience and motivate our peers to learn about and improve the world, from doing acts as small as donating a quarter to UNICEF’s Red Cup program to give a student a meal at school, to becoming involved in fundraisers, community events, or even the J8 competition in 2010 to help the world on a local and a global level. Whether or not we are given the opportunity to attend the summit, we feel that the problems currently afflicting the world are issues that cannot be neglected or avoided, and we will strive to educate and mobilize our community to help the world’s people and the environment. Thus, though most of our plans are not contingent upon attending the J8 Summit, the experiences we will have at the summit will greatly aid us in rallying our peers by providing us with the knowledge, know-how, ideas, and inspiration to make change.