Global issues

4. Global issues

• Environmental issues

  • Could be a result of combination of nature processes and human behaviour

Famine

• Can be caused by a lack of food due to hot weather also be caused by political leaders

• People do not have enough food / war conflict

• In history

  • The famine genocide in Ukraine

    • 1932-1933

    • Millions of deaths

    • By soviet union leader Stalin

  • The Great Chinese famine

    • Due to communist regime

    • 1959-1962

    • 15-45 million victims

• Today – Africa, North Korea

  • Also, in countries controlled by totalitarian regimes

Earthquakes

• Mostly in Asia

• Energy of earthquake is measured on Richter scale

  • Lower than 2 – almost hard to feel

  • 9 and higher – very strong, it may lead to total destruction

Tsunami

• A giant wave caused by an undersea earthquake

Floods

• Mostly a consequence of another disaster

• Social problems

  • Caused by humans – result of human behaviour

Poverty

• Worldwide problem

• People don’t have enough food, which leads to malnutrition and starvation

• Poor countries don’t have a good care system – illness

• African countries

Child labour

• Children are working on plantations with cocoa, cotton

• Children have to feed their families / themselves / siblings

• Used by corporates – pay little money to children – cheap labour

War / conflicts

• One of the worst global problem

• In history – many wars were caused by poverty, economic crisis also big social disparities

  • Fighting for power or territories (or both)

  • WWI and WWII

• Now – most common – causes of wars or conflicts are religion or nature resources

  • Ukraine, Syria

  • Chechenia etc.

Nuclear accidents

• Two major nuclear accidents – Fukushima (2011) – hits by tsunami wave

and Chernobyl (1986) – by human mistake

• Very dangerous – leak of radioactive fuel

• In the Czech Republic – two nuclear power plants – Temelín and Dukovany

Racisms

• Biological differences in race

• Xenophobia, discrimination

• Solution – tolerance, education, multicultural activities

In the future there could be various problems. For example

Water conflicts

• Almost 1 billion people don’t have access to clean water and it’s even worse

  • Some regions are getting hotter and drier

• If this problem isn’t solved – could be catastrophic

Climate change and global warming

• Its very controversial issue

• Many scientists came out whit evidence that global warming exists and its caused by human

• It could lead to a massive ice melt – rise of the worlds ocean level – global flooding

Resource

• Zdroj

Renewable resource

• Obnovitelné zdroje

Deforestation

• odlesňování

To deplete/depletion

• vyčerpat, spotřebovat / vyčerpání, úbytek

Illiteracy

• negramotnost

To preserve

• zachovat něco, udržet

To protect

• Chránit, ochránit

Burning of fossil fuels

• Spalování fosilních paliv – oil (ropa), coal (uhlí), natural gas (zemní plyn)

Rising sea levels

Zvyšování hladiny moře

Extinct

• Vyhynulý

Endangered

• Ohrožený

Harmful

• Škodlivý

Habitat

• Přirozené místo výskytu

Developing countries