Global Recovery: - United Nations Day of Vesak 2013

INTRODUCTION
Since the establishment of the International Association of Buddhist
Universities (IABU) in 2007, the international academic conference has been
organized as a part of the United Nations Day of Vesak Celebrations. The theme of
each year conference is determined differently concerning the world situation and
trend of the year. For instance, the theme of last year 2009 entitled, “Buddhist
Approach to Global Crisis,” reflecting the world facing crises in environment,
economics, and politics. At this event, Buddhist scholars from over the world had
been invited to propose their solutions through Buddhist perspectives. Continued
from last year, the theme of this year conference is its nexus. Wishing that the global
crises would be recovered from last year’s, therefore, this year theme has entitled,
“Global Recovery: The Buddhist Perspective” — which comprises 5 sub-themes in
details as follows;
Global Recovery through Buddhist Ecology:
This theme recognizes the scarcity of resources in the environment and the
changing conditions brought upon the planet by human manipulation of the
eco-system. It appears as though humans have wrecked rather than helped the
environment. We have not provided actual remedies for our sick and dying world.
Last year we faced many challenges in our sessions, and we continue a controversial
and popular environmental or ecological theme. This year we had difficulties and
nearly rejected almost every submitted article in this theme, and had to work closely
with some scholars to ensure that their papers included more scientific-natured data;
we had to reach a compromise with some articles, and others contained below offer
some refreshing insights into the strife that needs immediate attention. It was very
pleasing to see numerous case studies in several of the conference papers. We hope
in the future that we see greater developed case studies – when contributions are
received, we hope to see additional papers on how Buddhism becomes applicable
into the environment. In this sense, we can have real Buddhist Ecology. We know
that just learning Dhamma does not change the conditions of the world, so many
papers needed to be more engaged, scientifically – and rely less on scriptural
representations – common knowledge amongst us all.
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