Right now we are surrounded by so many challenges the humanity is facing, such as hunger, poverty, conflicts, environment, human trafficking, inaccessibility of clean water, lack of basic health care, inadequate education, inequality in many fronts, human rights violations, still no cure to cancer… painfully the list is long. Developing and inspiring new leaders of tomorrow who can find a better solutions to these challenges is one of INSAN’s core ambition.

Wrong Equation

We are at a very unique and critical time in the human history. Today, some of us have access to so many things and the lifestyles we live which would have been unthinkable to even for wealthy just a hundred year ago and yet on the other end so many people are struggling for the basics of life.

Our founder often reminds us that today the world has more educated people, doctors, engineers, scientists, PhDs, and we are now more scientifically and technically advanced than ever before. We have created more wealth and excess than ever before; but still humanity is crying everywhere.

The equation is most assuredly wrong!

Here is a small snapshot:

1. Nearly 1/2 of the world’s population — more than 3 billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day. More than 1.2 billion live in extreme poverty — less than $1.25 a day
2. 1 billion children worldwide are living in poverty.  According to UNICEF, 22,000 children die each day due to poverty
3. 805 million people worldwide do not have enough food to eat
4. More than 750 million people lack adequate access to clean drinking water.
5. Diarrhea caused by inadequate drinking water, sanitation, and hand hygiene kills an estimated 842,000 people every year globally, or approximately 2,300 people per day
6. 8.2 million Cancer related deaths in 2012. It is expected that annual cancer cases will rise from 14 million in 2012 to 22 million within the next 2 decades
7. Every year we dump a massive 2.12 billion tons of waste. If all this waste was put in a line of trucks they would go around the world 24 times
8. More than 168 million children are trapped in child labor
9. 20.9 million people are victims of forced labor including sex exploitation
10. 59.5 million people, a new record, have been displaced and live as refugees

Sources

1.    United Nations Development Programme. “Sustaining Human Progress: Reducing Vulnerabilities and Building   Resilience.” Human Development Report, 2014. Web Accessed August 3, 2015.
2.    United Nations Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME). “UNICEF: Committing to Child Survival: A promise renewed.” UNICEF, 2014. Web Accessed August 3, 2015.
3.    FAO, IFAD and WFP. “The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2014. Strengthening the enabling environment for   food security and nutrition.” Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN, 2014. Web Accessed August 3, 2015.
4.      World Health Organization and UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP). “Progress on Drinking Water and Sanitation, 2014 Update.” 2014. Web Accessed August 3, 2015.
5.      Ibid
6.     World Health Organization, Fact Sheet on Cancer and World Cancer Report 2014
7.     United Nations report: UNEP Yearbook 2009, p45
8.      International Labor Office, “Making Progress against Child Labour, Global Estimates & Trends 2000 – 2012”
9.      International Labour Organization, “ILO Global Estimates of Forced Labour: Results & Methodology 2012”

10.    US News and World Report, UN Report: In New Record, 60 Million Displaced Worldwide,  June 15, 2015