Sidney Lerner, a New York advertising executive who developed the campaign “Please don’t squeeze the Charmin” (Charmin is a US toilet paper brand known for its softness), recently passed away at the age of 90 on January 12, 2021. WellBeing International would like to convey...
Over the last twenty years (that is, this century), there has been an explosion of interest in measuring “happiness” and “subjective well-being.” These measurements are beginning to be used in the development of public policy. Bhutan is commonly regarded as a leader in the field,...
In an earlier ‘Letter from the President’ in WellBeing News (October 2020), we mentioned that the Food & Agriculture Organization of the United Nations’ (FAO) has predicted that the production of animal products would have to double to meet global demand in 2050. This prediction...
As the end of the calendar year approaches, it seems an appropriate time to revisit the core principles that underpin WellBeing International’s (WBI) initiatives during its first two years. These concepts include the original foundational idea of the importance of the interconnectedness of people, animals...
The global growth of the number of internet users is remarkable. According to Internet World Stats, 63.2% of the world’s population used the internet as of October 2020. If children aged 0-4 are removed from the calculation, that percentage increases to 69.3%. If children aged...
Are suburban yards/gardens good for wildlife? If you are one of the 57 million Americans who feed and watch birds at home that question may seem a little silly. And that number does not include the additional 15 million people who say they enjoy observing...
There are many organizations, municipalities and individuals around the world dedicating time, resources and much attention and love to the well-being of dogs and ending dog homelessness. Often, these projects do not have sufficient resources to reach the number of dogs to have measurable impact...
Data on dog numbers and dog well-being will be an important part of evaluating impact of different approaches to dog and human well-being in particular communities. The world currently has somewhere between 800 million and one billion domestic dogs. As such, they are the most...
A relatively recent saying, attributed to many different people, is that “prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.” In contrast, Peter Drucker, the global management guru, is quoted as saying that “the best way to predict the future is to create it.” ...
An earlier issue of WellBeing News explored the shifting historical baselines phenomenon. This phenomenon illustrates the tendency of ecologists to use recent wildlife population numbers as the baseline for their studies, even though the recent wildlife population may be much lower than the population 50...
