The 8th annual World Peace Day in Kincardine focused on world peace and how to achieve it.
Special speaker this year, the Executive Director of Project Ploughshares John Siebert, says world peace can be achieved but governments of the world and its citizens must constantly work at it.
Siebert addressed elementary and secondary school students throughout the day on Wednesday and held a community-wide meeting in Kincardine in the evening, attended by a handful of people.
Siebert says his message was that peace needs to be built up and cannot just depend on signed agreements.
He says it’s important to make sure peace is sustained where conflicts have ended and Canada can play a major role in that department.
Siebert says sadly Canada is not doing as much in peacekeeping as it has in the past.
He says contributions to peacekeeping have been dwindling since 1992.
He believes peace can be attained by attacking the root causes of conflicts, which includes poverty, inequality and lack of resources for some.
Siebert believes building the conditions for peace is working.
He says today there are 40 per cent fewer wars in the world than there was just 15-years ago.
Siebert says resorting to violence when there are conflicts, is not the answer.
Project Ploughshares is a non-governmental organization that works with churches, governments and civil society, in Canada and abroad, to advance policies and actions to prevent war and armed violence and build peace.