thank you very much everybody my name is
Ishaan Menon I started my journey
through Model United Nations I learned a
little bit more about the UN and over
time I decided that it was right for me
to join the United Nations Association
Malaysia we joined the youth circle
together a bunch of kids who are doing
Model UN learning more about the UN and
we thought they was they had to be a way
for us to contribute they had to be a
way for us to do something that’s when
we learned about things like the
sustainable development goals now when I
say the United Nations a lot of people
might meet skepticism might think oh is
the United Nations effective can it do
anything can it solve problems is it
effective at solving the world’s crisis
is all said and done today I want to go
through the sustainable development
goals with you and I want to explain how
people my age and I’m just 20 years old
people my age younger than me can
actually bring about change from their
hearts from their home and from their
neighborhoods so ladies and gentlemen 17
ways to save the world now when I first
started my journey with the United
Nations Association Malaysia I realized
several things the world might not be a
very happy place right now we’re about
7.5 billion people estimated we’re gonna
hit ten billion people by 2050 three
it’s the world is consuming more and
more goods as more and more people are
coming about but we don’t really have
much of an idea of as to how we’re going
to sustain this for long the future is
definitely a very scary place we’re not
entirely sure what its gonna look like
so it’s also good to bear in mind the
progress that we’ve made in these past
few years
you see the world today has seen
significant landmarks improvements in
very very important key factors now one
of them ayuk whole veridia to me is
youth literacy you see the useless
literacy rate has gone up by nearly ten
percent and at the end of it we’ve seen
the eradication of poverty we’ve seen
the levels of growth that are
exponential but they also had huge huge
challenges the challenges we face go
beyond just hunger beyond just the lack
of finances you see the world’s poverty
line is set to one dollar ninety cent
and today almost 1 in 10 people are
below that poverty line the world’s for
hungry we have one in nine people going
to bed without the right food intake to
proceed with their daily activities the
next day 385 million children starve
every night so it is you have to take
both into perspective
we’re losing species carbon dioxide
emissions are increasing rapidly we’ve
seen increases in millions of kilotons
of co2 emissions over years which have
caused significant damage to the climate
that we take we take for granted but
with that said when we take a look at
what young people can do given the fact
that they represent over 25 percent of
the world’s population we also have to
take into account the life expectancy of
people nowadays it’s increased by 10
years we’re living 10 years longer than
we used to
we’re much more literate than we used to
be in fact the world’s poverty has
actually decreased exponentially in fact
even with inflation taken into account
the number of people that have been
lifted out of poverty in the past is so
great that it is impossible to ignore
the progress that we’ve made but
balancing the progress we’ve made with
the challenges that we’re facing we need
to still find a way of achieving the
changes we want to achieve of moving
forward it’s not so much about what
we’ve done before it’s not so much about
the past it’s about the future and when
the United Nations came up with what it
called the Millennium Development Goals
in the year 2000 the United Nations
wanted to create a pathway for Hugh
to achieve a better status so people to
to people to feel empowered for them to
feel that there is some progress going
on for governments to understand how
they can contribute so post-2015 the
United Nations could not leave the
Millennium Goals expired it could not
leave it then the United Nations came up
with what was called the sustainable
development goals the sustainable
development goals were to serve from the
Year 2015 to the year 2030 and they came
about for the specific reason that the
Millennium Development Goals had left
out certain agendas that were very very
important to people like you and me for
the generations to come
not the generations that already have
the tools they need to succeed to make
the world a better place this was for
the young generation that the under 25s
the under-15s 25 percent of the world’s
population so between the years 2015 and
2030 a lot is supposed to happen a lot
should happen but just take a moment and
think in the year 2030 how old would you
be how long-term has this planning pin
and what are you gonna do in those years
in that gap between 2015 2030 and 2017
right now we don’t have much time to
reach the end of the sustainable
development goals and those goals will
change I’m gonna go through the
sustainable development goals with
everyone here and as I go through them I
want everyone to keep in mind what the
goals are and how they can contribute
ban ki-moon once said there is no plan B
because there’s no planet B this is our
only home unless Elon Musk gets us to
Mars quickly we’re not going anytime
soon
so with this planet we need to bear in
mind what we need to do to make it a
better place while we’re still here this
tiny blue marble is ours now the 17
goals set up by the United Nations are
very very all-encompassing these goals
basically represent the aims of humanity
so I’ll go through them with you and I
really hope that everyone in the
audience today remembers them and at
least takes into account the goals that
they care about I’ll tell you why that’s
important later but let’s start with
gold one eradicating poverty no poverty
there should be no one below the current
world poverty line we should ensure that
people are earning enough to have
decent living eradication of hunger how
many people go to bed hungry at night we
don’t week it’s difficult for us to
relate to the kind of struggles people
face when they can’t eat enough to
sustain themselves for the next day
when when they have hard labor planned
out in the end then the daily activities
and they can’t do it because they don’t
have the energy to it they don’t have
the calorie intake to proceed with the
daily activities good health and
well-being now this is this is very very
meaningful to me because I have grown up
in Southeast Asia I’ve seen when I was a
kid
the sazanka the epidemic came about I’ve
seen multiple people friends of mine
kindergarten friends who were affected
advice loss was very very interesting
for me and I realized at that point of
time education on good health and
well-being was key was key to preventing
the spread of such diseases moving on
from good health and well-being low
quality education many of you here have
had access to that many of you here
privileged enough to have said yes I
have had access to quality education
I am literate and I’m aware of the
challenges that my community faces a
quality education grows an extreme
extremely long way and that’s why it’s
on the priorities of the sustainable
development goals gender equality need i
say more
to 2017 why are we still oppressing 1/2
of humanity why do we still believe that
there is no disparity between men and
women in our society why are we not
acknowledging the problem why don’t we
work towards a solution this is the
first step
knowledge in the problems humanity is
faced and sustainable development goal
number 5 clearly articulates that what
is in our heads sustainable development
goal 6 is about clean water and
sanitation and it’s not as simple as it
sounds getting access to clean water may
seem simple to you you can turn on a tap
you get clean water but for a lot of
people it’s a killer meter walk it’s two
kilometres down in a desert and people
are trying they have to do so much just
to get access to water to for their
families to drink to do wash their wash
their dishes they still have to go so
far away and get that water and most of
the time that what is most like not
clean they have diseases they are
contaminated and the problem with access
to clean water and sanitation is people
aren’t really aware of how big the
problem is
but it goes beyond that affordable and
clean energy this is something we can
all relate to because some of us might
even have hybrid cars at home some of us
may understand the need to move to more
sustainable energy sources we don’t
really see the importance of gaining
access to affordable energy so that’s
why this sustainable development goal is
affordable and clean energy as well
goal number eight is on decent work in
economic growth this goal specifically
focuses on making sure everyone has
decent work not just not just a job not
just a day job you cannot be a bonded
labor laborer or modern-day slave in
2017 it’s not acceptable
it’s it’s incredibly incredibly
heartbreaking to see people have their
passports confiscated and find
themselves in a position where then are
able to return home because they have an
incredible amount of debt that they
didn’t even know they didn’t cure so
finding decent work and economic growth
is extremely important especially in the
age of information technology where jobs
are being automated and people are gonna
find themselves completely lost because
machines are doing what they do moving
on from that industry innovation in
infrastructure is where we can play a
part in terms of developing our
industries to make them more efficient
more effective less impactful on our
economy or on our climate on our planet
we need to ensure that the industries
that we develop take into account the
challenges the planet’s facing reduced
inequalities income inequality is a big
issue certain everyone’s aware of it but
reduced inequality stands for reducing
qualities across the board not just
economically but also discrimination
against people from from the different
skin colors religion they should be less
in equal in equality in the year 2030
sustainable season communities ensuring
that your community is able to run
itself without damaging the environment
responsible consumption and production
recycle your water bottles reuse them
while we why are we purchasing goods
that we’re not going to need a day later
that we’re going to just throw away
climate action
shree Haiti uses is an eco school
understanding climate action comes from
understanding the importance of work
two words a better planet working two
words a planet that will last for
generations to come
understanding that that that human
impacts on the climate have been so so
substantial in recent years that we at
risk of losing this place we call home
life below order ensuring that we’re not
littering the ocean and causing marine
life to suffer life on land ensuring
that we’re not poaching endangered
animals we are fully aware of the fact
that the rate of extinction is between a
thousand and ten thousand times the
natural rate already because of human
activity my personal favorite peace
justice and strong institutions to
ensure that everyone has access to
justice and we have a peaceful and
stable Society now the last goal is a
bit interesting this goal is more aimed
towards governments but it also is a
people-to-people relationship ensuring
that we have partnerships between each
other to achieve these goals while it
may not seem that important in context
of all the other goals it is important
to remember that by expanding horizons
meeting new people and gaining new
perspectives you can form partnerships
for these goals now with that said there
are three within three levels to this
the United Nations has been very very
kind in providing a very simple guide
for anyone who wants to contribute to
the sustainable development goals in the
three ways the first level or the first
way of doing it is just doing in our
homeless on the sofa just sharing
articles or being mindful about the
sustainable development goals it already
makes you a sofa superstar when you get
to the next step is when you’re a
household hero when you’re at home and
you’re encouraging your family when
you’re encouraging you you’re free or
your extended family or cousins your
neighbors maybe yes just your just your
vicinity if you’re able to encourage
people to adopt these goals and
understand the importance of moving
forward you will become a household hero
when you move forward to the next step
you become a neighborhood nice guy and
that essentially means you’ve managed to
bring about your entire community put
them together and focus them around
these goals make sure they’re aware of
these goals and at the same time you’re
working with local businesses you’re
working with NGOs with with other
partners that you could potentially
identify at home on the internet that
you see would be interested in
developing further these
developments now aside from the first
three levels of working out the
sustainable development goals there are
a lot of other things you can do once
you have found your passion and that’s
why it is important that’s why I
mentioned early that you should find
your goals because when you’ve
identified your passion and what you
care about the most among the
sustainable development goals you will
do everything in your power everything
in your power to ensure that you bring
about some change so think about the 17
goals think about what you can do and
the next step for you is to find your
inspiration so the inspiration can come
from anywhere
personally for me my inspiration was
from a gentleman by the name of Zuna
he’s not Mahatma Gandhi he’s not Martin
Luther King jr. but this man is a
cartoonist who I care about a lot
because he cares about me a lot when I
mentioned that I care about sustainable
development goals 16 I’d mentioned that
because that goal to me matters the most
to my country I believe this is
something that will impact Malaysia for
generations to come if we ban mine the
need for peace justice and sustainable
strong institutions in our country we
will know that we have achieved a much
better democracy this gentleman right
here has faced multiple charges multiple
charges for his cartoons just for his
cartoons his satire on the government
and when we invited him to our event we
weren’t even sure whether you’d be able
to make it but we were extremely glad to
see him then we were happy to hear him
say things that inspired us that kept us
going I want you to find your
inspiration my inspiration was Oona and
I’m sure you’ll find yours now beyond
Zuna and beyond my inspiration there’s
another key step to trying to implement
the sustainable development goals in
your community and that key step is also
expanding your horizons
expanding your horizons involves meeting
people from all over the world who are
fully aware of the challenges you face
and who share the same opinions as you
and who have the same thoughts ideas and
concepts people who you might not have
on you might not have understood their
background clearly you might not know
where they’re from
you might not know why they believe what
they believe in but for some reason they
believe in it and so do you so I’ll
leave you with this at the end of it
once you’ve met the right people once
you’ve been inspired and once you’ve
found your goals you can bring about
change regardless of who you are
regardless of how old you are mine
regardless of what you do for a living
at the end of it what matters is what’s
in here thank you have a nice day
everyone and I look forward to the next
speakers
[Music]
[Applause]
Ishaan Menon I started my journey
through Model United Nations I learned a
little bit more about the UN and over
time I decided that it was right for me
to join the United Nations Association
Malaysia we joined the youth circle
together a bunch of kids who are doing
Model UN learning more about the UN and
we thought they was they had to be a way
for us to contribute they had to be a
way for us to do something that’s when
we learned about things like the
sustainable development goals now when I
say the United Nations a lot of people
might meet skepticism might think oh is
the United Nations effective can it do
anything can it solve problems is it
effective at solving the world’s crisis
is all said and done today I want to go
through the sustainable development
goals with you and I want to explain how
people my age and I’m just 20 years old
people my age younger than me can
actually bring about change from their
hearts from their home and from their
neighborhoods so ladies and gentlemen 17
ways to save the world now when I first
started my journey with the United
Nations Association Malaysia I realized
several things the world might not be a
very happy place right now we’re about
7.5 billion people estimated we’re gonna
hit ten billion people by 2050 three
it’s the world is consuming more and
more goods as more and more people are
coming about but we don’t really have
much of an idea of as to how we’re going
to sustain this for long the future is
definitely a very scary place we’re not
entirely sure what its gonna look like
so it’s also good to bear in mind the
progress that we’ve made in these past
few years
you see the world today has seen
significant landmarks improvements in
very very important key factors now one
of them ayuk whole veridia to me is
youth literacy you see the useless
literacy rate has gone up by nearly ten
percent and at the end of it we’ve seen
the eradication of poverty we’ve seen
the levels of growth that are
exponential but they also had huge huge
challenges the challenges we face go
beyond just hunger beyond just the lack
of finances you see the world’s poverty
line is set to one dollar ninety cent
and today almost 1 in 10 people are
below that poverty line the world’s for
hungry we have one in nine people going
to bed without the right food intake to
proceed with their daily activities the
next day 385 million children starve
every night so it is you have to take
both into perspective
we’re losing species carbon dioxide
emissions are increasing rapidly we’ve
seen increases in millions of kilotons
of co2 emissions over years which have
caused significant damage to the climate
that we take we take for granted but
with that said when we take a look at
what young people can do given the fact
that they represent over 25 percent of
the world’s population we also have to
take into account the life expectancy of
people nowadays it’s increased by 10
years we’re living 10 years longer than
we used to
we’re much more literate than we used to
be in fact the world’s poverty has
actually decreased exponentially in fact
even with inflation taken into account
the number of people that have been
lifted out of poverty in the past is so
great that it is impossible to ignore
the progress that we’ve made but
balancing the progress we’ve made with
the challenges that we’re facing we need
to still find a way of achieving the
changes we want to achieve of moving
forward it’s not so much about what
we’ve done before it’s not so much about
the past it’s about the future and when
the United Nations came up with what it
called the Millennium Development Goals
in the year 2000 the United Nations
wanted to create a pathway for Hugh
to achieve a better status so people to
to people to feel empowered for them to
feel that there is some progress going
on for governments to understand how
they can contribute so post-2015 the
United Nations could not leave the
Millennium Goals expired it could not
leave it then the United Nations came up
with what was called the sustainable
development goals the sustainable
development goals were to serve from the
Year 2015 to the year 2030 and they came
about for the specific reason that the
Millennium Development Goals had left
out certain agendas that were very very
important to people like you and me for
the generations to come
not the generations that already have
the tools they need to succeed to make
the world a better place this was for
the young generation that the under 25s
the under-15s 25 percent of the world’s
population so between the years 2015 and
2030 a lot is supposed to happen a lot
should happen but just take a moment and
think in the year 2030 how old would you
be how long-term has this planning pin
and what are you gonna do in those years
in that gap between 2015 2030 and 2017
right now we don’t have much time to
reach the end of the sustainable
development goals and those goals will
change I’m gonna go through the
sustainable development goals with
everyone here and as I go through them I
want everyone to keep in mind what the
goals are and how they can contribute
ban ki-moon once said there is no plan B
because there’s no planet B this is our
only home unless Elon Musk gets us to
Mars quickly we’re not going anytime
soon
so with this planet we need to bear in
mind what we need to do to make it a
better place while we’re still here this
tiny blue marble is ours now the 17
goals set up by the United Nations are
very very all-encompassing these goals
basically represent the aims of humanity
so I’ll go through them with you and I
really hope that everyone in the
audience today remembers them and at
least takes into account the goals that
they care about I’ll tell you why that’s
important later but let’s start with
gold one eradicating poverty no poverty
there should be no one below the current
world poverty line we should ensure that
people are earning enough to have
decent living eradication of hunger how
many people go to bed hungry at night we
don’t week it’s difficult for us to
relate to the kind of struggles people
face when they can’t eat enough to
sustain themselves for the next day
when when they have hard labor planned
out in the end then the daily activities
and they can’t do it because they don’t
have the energy to it they don’t have
the calorie intake to proceed with the
daily activities good health and
well-being now this is this is very very
meaningful to me because I have grown up
in Southeast Asia I’ve seen when I was a
kid
the sazanka the epidemic came about I’ve
seen multiple people friends of mine
kindergarten friends who were affected
advice loss was very very interesting
for me and I realized at that point of
time education on good health and
well-being was key was key to preventing
the spread of such diseases moving on
from good health and well-being low
quality education many of you here have
had access to that many of you here
privileged enough to have said yes I
have had access to quality education
I am literate and I’m aware of the
challenges that my community faces a
quality education grows an extreme
extremely long way and that’s why it’s
on the priorities of the sustainable
development goals gender equality need i
say more
to 2017 why are we still oppressing 1/2
of humanity why do we still believe that
there is no disparity between men and
women in our society why are we not
acknowledging the problem why don’t we
work towards a solution this is the
first step
knowledge in the problems humanity is
faced and sustainable development goal
number 5 clearly articulates that what
is in our heads sustainable development
goal 6 is about clean water and
sanitation and it’s not as simple as it
sounds getting access to clean water may
seem simple to you you can turn on a tap
you get clean water but for a lot of
people it’s a killer meter walk it’s two
kilometres down in a desert and people
are trying they have to do so much just
to get access to water to for their
families to drink to do wash their wash
their dishes they still have to go so
far away and get that water and most of
the time that what is most like not
clean they have diseases they are
contaminated and the problem with access
to clean water and sanitation is people
aren’t really aware of how big the
problem is
but it goes beyond that affordable and
clean energy this is something we can
all relate to because some of us might
even have hybrid cars at home some of us
may understand the need to move to more
sustainable energy sources we don’t
really see the importance of gaining
access to affordable energy so that’s
why this sustainable development goal is
affordable and clean energy as well
goal number eight is on decent work in
economic growth this goal specifically
focuses on making sure everyone has
decent work not just not just a job not
just a day job you cannot be a bonded
labor laborer or modern-day slave in
2017 it’s not acceptable
it’s it’s incredibly incredibly
heartbreaking to see people have their
passports confiscated and find
themselves in a position where then are
able to return home because they have an
incredible amount of debt that they
didn’t even know they didn’t cure so
finding decent work and economic growth
is extremely important especially in the
age of information technology where jobs
are being automated and people are gonna
find themselves completely lost because
machines are doing what they do moving
on from that industry innovation in
infrastructure is where we can play a
part in terms of developing our
industries to make them more efficient
more effective less impactful on our
economy or on our climate on our planet
we need to ensure that the industries
that we develop take into account the
challenges the planet’s facing reduced
inequalities income inequality is a big
issue certain everyone’s aware of it but
reduced inequality stands for reducing
qualities across the board not just
economically but also discrimination
against people from from the different
skin colors religion they should be less
in equal in equality in the year 2030
sustainable season communities ensuring
that your community is able to run
itself without damaging the environment
responsible consumption and production
recycle your water bottles reuse them
while we why are we purchasing goods
that we’re not going to need a day later
that we’re going to just throw away
climate action
shree Haiti uses is an eco school
understanding climate action comes from
understanding the importance of work
two words a better planet working two
words a planet that will last for
generations to come
understanding that that that human
impacts on the climate have been so so
substantial in recent years that we at
risk of losing this place we call home
life below order ensuring that we’re not
littering the ocean and causing marine
life to suffer life on land ensuring
that we’re not poaching endangered
animals we are fully aware of the fact
that the rate of extinction is between a
thousand and ten thousand times the
natural rate already because of human
activity my personal favorite peace
justice and strong institutions to
ensure that everyone has access to
justice and we have a peaceful and
stable Society now the last goal is a
bit interesting this goal is more aimed
towards governments but it also is a
people-to-people relationship ensuring
that we have partnerships between each
other to achieve these goals while it
may not seem that important in context
of all the other goals it is important
to remember that by expanding horizons
meeting new people and gaining new
perspectives you can form partnerships
for these goals now with that said there
are three within three levels to this
the United Nations has been very very
kind in providing a very simple guide
for anyone who wants to contribute to
the sustainable development goals in the
three ways the first level or the first
way of doing it is just doing in our
homeless on the sofa just sharing
articles or being mindful about the
sustainable development goals it already
makes you a sofa superstar when you get
to the next step is when you’re a
household hero when you’re at home and
you’re encouraging your family when
you’re encouraging you you’re free or
your extended family or cousins your
neighbors maybe yes just your just your
vicinity if you’re able to encourage
people to adopt these goals and
understand the importance of moving
forward you will become a household hero
when you move forward to the next step
you become a neighborhood nice guy and
that essentially means you’ve managed to
bring about your entire community put
them together and focus them around
these goals make sure they’re aware of
these goals and at the same time you’re
working with local businesses you’re
working with NGOs with with other
partners that you could potentially
identify at home on the internet that
you see would be interested in
developing further these
developments now aside from the first
three levels of working out the
sustainable development goals there are
a lot of other things you can do once
you have found your passion and that’s
why it is important that’s why I
mentioned early that you should find
your goals because when you’ve
identified your passion and what you
care about the most among the
sustainable development goals you will
do everything in your power everything
in your power to ensure that you bring
about some change so think about the 17
goals think about what you can do and
the next step for you is to find your
inspiration so the inspiration can come
from anywhere
personally for me my inspiration was
from a gentleman by the name of Zuna
he’s not Mahatma Gandhi he’s not Martin
Luther King jr. but this man is a
cartoonist who I care about a lot
because he cares about me a lot when I
mentioned that I care about sustainable
development goals 16 I’d mentioned that
because that goal to me matters the most
to my country I believe this is
something that will impact Malaysia for
generations to come if we ban mine the
need for peace justice and sustainable
strong institutions in our country we
will know that we have achieved a much
better democracy this gentleman right
here has faced multiple charges multiple
charges for his cartoons just for his
cartoons his satire on the government
and when we invited him to our event we
weren’t even sure whether you’d be able
to make it but we were extremely glad to
see him then we were happy to hear him
say things that inspired us that kept us
going I want you to find your
inspiration my inspiration was Oona and
I’m sure you’ll find yours now beyond
Zuna and beyond my inspiration there’s
another key step to trying to implement
the sustainable development goals in
your community and that key step is also
expanding your horizons
expanding your horizons involves meeting
people from all over the world who are
fully aware of the challenges you face
and who share the same opinions as you
and who have the same thoughts ideas and
concepts people who you might not have
on you might not have understood their
background clearly you might not know
where they’re from
you might not know why they believe what
they believe in but for some reason they
believe in it and so do you so I’ll
leave you with this at the end of it
once you’ve met the right people once
you’ve been inspired and once you’ve
found your goals you can bring about
change regardless of who you are
regardless of how old you are mine
regardless of what you do for a living
at the end of it what matters is what’s
in here thank you have a nice day
everyone and I look forward to the next
speakers
[Music]
[Applause]
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