This Harmony Day, Australia Needs to Learn How to Live in a Global Community

A spotlight on why Australia should assist with the current famine crisis in Yemen.

In a day and age where technology has become such a prominent part of our society, it is no longer acceptable to isolate ‘our problems’ as those within our national borders.

We have progressed far enough that electronic mediums give us complete access to international information. It is on such a day as Harmony Day (March 21) that we must learn to truly understand what it means to live in a global community.

With the above in mind, let’s consider the current famine crisis in Yemen, which is being called the world’s worst humanitarian disaster.

Stats published in December of 2016 stated that nearly 2.2 million children in Yemen suffered from acute malnourishment and required emergency care, with a 200 percent increase of cases since 2014. However, this is not the only affliction these children are suffering from. The Iran-Saudi Arabia proxy war leaves six Yemeni children dead or wounded every day, according to statistics from April last year. It is because of this war that there are also more than seven million children in need of medical care. Nearly six million Yemeni children live in poverty; this equates to just under a quarter of the entire population of Australia.

Despite our feelings of disconnectedness from such catastrophes, it is on days such as Harmony Day that we realise how interconnected we all are as a global community.

Our planet is not as big as we think it is. We live in an age were text messages are sent around the globe almost instantly. It would take a commercial flight just 47 hours to circle around the entirety of the globe (without refuelling, though fuel’s probably going to be necessary for that long-haul). Because we live in the land down under, we may feel removed, yet this is no excuse to live in ignorance. As a developed country, Australia is privileged enough to have sufficient resources to not live in such terrible conditions like those in Yemen.

The ABC showed that Australia’s current foreign aid spending is at an eight-year low, with a $28 million drop in finances sent to sub-Saharan Africa and nothing at all going to the current crisis in Yemen. That’s right, not a single cent of our well-earned money is going anywhere near their 2.2 million children starving to death.

Today is Harmony Day; a time to celebrate our diversity and interconnectedness as a national community. But I urge you to not just think about our national community, but the connectedness we share with everyone on this planet.

We are all human; some of us are just better off than others. If you wouldn’t want to see a quarter of Australia’s population living in poverty, then there is no way you would want to see that many children in one country in those conditions. It is happening, and we need to spread awareness.

Harmony Day is not just about the harmony we share within our country, but within our planet.

Georgia Clements is one of Student Edge’s student contributors. See more student contributions here.

Photo: iStock