I enjoyed the Honor and the Privilege of attending the United Nations Headquarters SDG Action Weekend in NY on September 16 and 17, 2023, and it proved AMAZING!!!
I learned where I need to focus my advocacy and legislation, and met the appropriate contacts to commence dialogues.
For example, I learned that the UN defines “food transformation” as reducing, rather than eliminating, “meat and milk” because according to one of my contacts, less developed countries do not have access to the nutrition that developed countries do and they need “protein” from nonhuman flesh and secretions. Additionally, he claims that the elimination of factory farming is not necessary to sufficiently reduce carbon emissions.
Of course, we Know the two aforementioned statements remain FALSE.
My contact and I agreed to communicate via email to share statistics regarding protein and carbon emissions in order to engage in productive discussions.
I attended the conference because, after I finally drafted a proposed charter amendment for the UN (as the time is ripe), and emailed same and supporting documentation to almost all of the 193 members (except four countries that remain involved in heated controversies to the point where Americans should not visit their countries although one head of state surprisingly attended the UN GA Summit), I realized my proposed charter amendment resolved six of the 17 UN SDGs as follows:
1 No Poverty
2 Zero Hunger
3 Good Health and Well-Being
13 Climate Action
14 Life Below Water
15 Life on Land
In addition, I learned I should attend the UN RBA meetings.
The three UN Rome based agencies (RBAs),
Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO);
International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD);
World Food Programme (WFP);
offer a vast range of knowledge, financial and technical expertise, and discuss policy issues related to food security, agriculture and nutrition.