Press Release: World Future Council supports right of peaceful protest in Kenya

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MEDIA RELEASE: WORLD FOOD DAY: WORLD FUTURE COUNCIL CALLS FOR WELLBEING OF PEOPLE AND NATURE THROUGH SUSTAINABLE FOOD SYSTEMS

The Good Council – The official podcast of the World Future Council

    The Good Council – The official podcast of the World Future Council, season 1 out now

    First episode with founder of the World Future Council, Jakob von Uexkull, to be launched 6 September 2021.
    Hamburg, 6th of September 2021 – The new podcast series of the World Future Council, The Good Council, launches today for the first season of intergenerational dialogues involving the World Future Council’s youth forum, Youth:Present. Each dialogue involves two changemakers—Councillors and Youth:Present representatives or young WFC members—who discuss their work towards a sustainable present and a common future.

    Established in 2007, the World Future Council is a foundation that envisions a healthy and sustainable planet with just and peaceful societies – now and in the future. To achieve this, the foundation identifies, develops, highlights, and disseminates future-just solutions for the current challenges of humanity. Every year, it celebrates outstanding policies in areas of urgent attention, such as biodiversity, rights of women and children, or protection from hazardous chemicals, with the Future Policy Award. This podcast series provides a behind-the-scenes insight into how a revolutionary idea became reality, from the very beginnings to its current agenda, offering inspiration, best practices, entertainment, and food for thought.

    “For the first season of this new podcast series, we’re bringing together our co-founders and Councillors with young activists and entrepreneurs from around the globe in intergenerational dialogues”, says Alexandra Wandel, Chair of the Management Board, “We are very excited by this podcast which covers some inspiring stories, and personal insights between the trailblazers and changemakers who make up the World Future Council”.

    The first episode of this brand-new season focuses on the establishment of the World Future Council, told by founder Jakob von Uexkull, as well as his concerns for the present and hopes for the future. How can the course of destruction be reversed? And is humanity still up for the challenge?

    Part of the first season are Youth:Present representatives Raina Ivanova (Germany) and Patricia Kombo and Akinyi Obama-Manners (both from Kenya). They talk to German pioneer and thinker Prof. Ernst-Ulrich von Weizsäcker, Kenyan environmentalist Wanjira Mathai (known for furthering the Green Belt Movement founded by Wangari Mathai), and Nigerian human rights activist Hafsat Abiola-Costello, respectively. Together with Greta Thunberg of Sweden, Raina is currently part of the first legal challenge by 16 young activists to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. Patricia is promoting education for sustainable development in Kenya, including by planting trees, for which she has also been named a UNCCD Land Hero by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification. And Akinyi Obama-Manners is advancing children’s education at Kenyan foundation Sauti Kuu, founded by Auma Obama.

    Also featured in this first season of The Good Council are co-founders Prof Herbert Girardet, expert on regenerative cities and Club of Rome member, and Dr Michael Otto, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Otto Group in Hamburg, Germany. Both discuss successes of the work of the World Future Council, as well as what each person can do in their lives individually.

    “In order to build our common future, it is of utmost importance to consult all generations. In particular, young people of today will be leaders of tomorrow – without them, we will not be successful in preserving our planet for future generations. That’s why intergenerational dialogues, as in The Good Council, play a crucial role in that endeavour, and I very much enjoyed being part of it,” says Jakob von Uexkull, Founder of the World Future Council and the Alternative Nobel Price.

    Each episode will inform and entertain by providing listeners with inspirational stories of people and best practices that will help people and the planet towards achieving sustainable solutions for our common future. New episodes will be released every other Monday, starting 6 September 2021.

    All episodes will be available at https://old.worldfuturecouncil.org/the-good-council/, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen.


    MEDIA CONTACT
    Anna-Lara Stehn
    Media & Communications Manager
    World Future Council
    anna-lara.stehn@worldfuturecouncil.org
    +49 (0) 1703813807

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    Press Release: María Fernanda Espinosa was elected President of the 73rd UN General Assembly

    Member of World Future Council and Ecuadorian Foreign Minister María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés, was elected President of the 73rd UN General Assembly

    New York/Hamburg, 6 June 2018 – Dr. María Fernanda Espinosa, Member of the World Future Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Human Mobility in Ecuador, was elected 73rd President of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) yesterday.
    According to the UN, Dr. María Fernanda Espinosa secured 128 votes against 62 votes obtained by the only other candidate, UN Ambassador Mary Elizabeth Flores Flake of Honduras.

    Dr. María Fernanda Espinosa: The Ecuadorian politician and poet is the fourth woman and the first woman ever from Latin America and the Caribbean to preside over the UN General Assembly Picture (c) World Future Council

    Alexandra Wandel, Director of the World Future Council (WFC), congratulates:

    On behalf of the World Future Council, I would like to congratulate you on your election, and send my best wishes in your esteemed position as 73rd President. Your leadership and inspiring vision will help to strengthen the United Nations, and global society as a whole.

    The forthcoming 73rd session offers a key moment to advance intergenerational equity in the UN System to ensure that the needs of present generations are met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs. We recognise the longstanding interest and support shown by the Government of Ecuador in these efforts, not least during your former position as Minister of Natural and Cultural Heritage. We are confident that with you as President of the UN General Assembly, future generations will have a strong advocate within the United Nations.

    The World Future Council is working with the informal Governmental Group of Friends for Future Generations, which provides an important platform to develop new initiatives in this area. The Group of Friends endorsed the proposal to establish Global Guardians for Future Generations, to provide balanced advocacy for future generations, so that the UN can play a leading role in securing intra- and inter-generational equity globally. The innovative nature and normative legitimacy of the Global Guardians for Future Generations will play an important role in complementing existing efforts to help ensure that the UN Development System is more inclusive, impactful and coherent. With your esteemed leadership, the 73rd session of UNGA will seize new initiatives at a time when achieving fairness between generations in the context of sustainable development is becoming all the more important. This as a unique moment for significant breakthrough on the Global Guardians proposal, which would be welcomed by Member States and civil society.

    We wish you just the best success for your endeavours, and strongly hope that working together decisively, we will promote the interests of future generations and our mutual values.

    Yours sincerely,

    Alexandra Wandel

    Director

    World Future Council

    Ms. Espinosa (2nd from left) speaking during World Future Council (WFC) event in Hamburg in 2016. Also pictured: WFC Councillors Scilla Elworthy, Thais Corral and Rama Mani (from left to right). Picture (c) World Future Council

     

    Media contact

    For more information, or to arrange an interview, please contact

    Media Contact

    Miriam Petersen
    Media and Communications Manager
    World Future Council
    Dorotheenstr. 15, 22301 Hamburg, Germany
    Email: miriam.petersen@worldfuturecouncil.org
    Phone: 01781018019
    www.worldfuturecouncil.org

    About the World Future Council

    The World Future Council (WFC) consists of up to 50 eminent global changemakers from governments, parliaments, civil society, academia, the arts, and business who have already successfully created change. We work to pass on a healthy planet and fair societies to our children and grandchildren. To achieve this, we focus on identifying and spreading effective, future just policy solutions and promote their implementation worldwide. Jakob von Uexkull, the Founder of the Alternative Nobel Prize, launched the World Future Council in 2007. We are an independent, non-profit organization under German law and finance our activities from donations. For information visit www.worldfuturecouncil.org

    For press enquiries, please contact Miriam Petersen, miriam.petersen@worldfuturecouncil.org, 0049 40 307 09 14 19.

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