Tuesday 20 May 2008

The Big Picture

A Child Starving to Death in Sudan and detail from Lucian Freud's Benefits Supervisor Sleeping (1995)Health warning: Being fat shortens your life and kills people and wildlife in other parts of the world.
Amidst news of natural disasters in China and Burma and the constant dribble of stabbings in London, two BBC News headlines caught my eye last week:
1. Obese blamed for the world's ills (CLICK)
2. Wildlife populations 'plummeting' (CLICK).
"Between a quarter and a third of the world's wildlife has been lost since 1970, according to data compiled by the Zoological Society of London" (BBC News). Now scroll down to view the Ecological Footprint Chart, which I've squeezed into just under 400 pixels. It shows you where the fatties live. Top of the planet plunderers are the USA, Australia and the UK (statistics from the World Wildlife Fund, title link). Together, the graphics above and below show The Big Picture.
Chart showing the ecological footprint per person by country (2003)Of course you don't need to be fat to plunder the planet's resources, but it helps!

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