The UN is more important than ever

The United States, along with other nations of the world, will celebrate United Nations Day today, the anniversary of the day in 1945 the United Nations Charter went into effect. As the president of the Iowa United Nations Association I am convinced the UN is more important than ever. The Iowa UNA is a non-partisan membership organization that has worked for over 60 years to inform Iowans about the work of the UN, to engage them in this work, and to advocate for constructive U.S. leadership in international organizations.

I was lucky enough to be able to attend the Paris Climate Summit in December of 2015 as a representative of the Iowa UNA. At the conference, 197 countries plus the EU signed the historic Paris Accord that has started the world on a path toward addressing global climate issues. In addition to the leaders and negotiators from the participating countries, the conference was attended by scores of non-governmental agencies (NGOs), over 400 corporations, and thousands of people from around the world coming to learn about climate change projects and plans from displays and presentations.

I am personally saddened by the fact that climate change has become a partisan issue in this country. Climate change is starting to happen already very noticeably at the poles and in coastal cities and on island countries. We may be reaching a tipping point, perhaps by 2050, when there will be no possibility of heading off this catastrophe. In 1969, I was a bush pilot in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, a place where the Arctic Ocean was frozen solid enough that trucks could drive on it. Forty-seven years later, at the same site and same time of year, there is now open ocean where the ice had been. Scientists say that, though the world has experienced changes in climate before, the speed of the change we are seeing today is unlike anything we've ever seen before.

On the positive side, three Iowa mayors (Mayor Cownie of Des Moines, Mayor Throgmorton of Iowa City, and Mayor Buol of Dubuque), along with over 560 mayors worldwide, have joined the Compact of Mayors, an initiative launched by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that will help put Iowa and the world on track toward mitigating the effects of climate change. The impending crisis and the need for renewable energy sources have created many opportunities for business and economic growth. I hope that more Iowa mayors, with the support of their city councils, will take advantage of these opportunities and join the Compact of Mayors. The Iowa UNA intends to lend its help and encouragement to this process.

Climate change is only one of a number of issues on the UN agenda. The UN employs peacekeepers in war torn regions of the world and works on improving health care, eliminating poverty, providing quality education for all (with an emphasis on education for girls), and protecting and resettling refugees, to name a few. To these ends, in 2015, the UN adopted a new set of 17 objectives, called Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which they will try to achieve by 2030. These SDGs aim to address the broadest goals of the UN, such as peace, justice, collaboration, elimination of poverty, and empowerment of women, and additionally focus on 169 specific targets. For more information about any of the United Nations programs, including the Sustainable Development Goals, see the Iowa UNA website and the UN website.

In celebration of UN Day, John Lange, former U.S. Ambassador to Botswana and current head of global health diplomacy at the United Nations Foundation, will be speaking on 'Global Health and Sustainability” to the Linn County Chapter of UNA-USA on October 25. The meeting is at 7 p.m. at First Lutheran Church, 1000 Third Avenue SE. It is free and open to the public. The meeting is co-sponsored by the Cedar Rapids/Marion League of Women Voters.

In the spirit of United Nations Day, may we all work together to improve our lives and save our planet.

' John H. Fraser is president of the Iowa United Nations Association. More information: www.iowauna.org