Dr. Abdhesh Gangwar, Programme Director, CEE Himalaya and CEE North-East was invited as a guest speaker, and a judge, to address the students and teachers of 29 premiere schools of India gathered at The Doon School, Dehradun from 23-24 April . This was at the Youth Conference -‘Earth & Man’ (YCEM-2013) jointly organised by ‘The Doon School’ and ‘The Achievers’ Programme’, Chandigarh.
Mr. Gangwar, talked about the current challenges in environment and development and how schools could contribute to environmental protection, increase their handprint and reduce their footprint.

From each of the 29 schools, a teacher and two students shared the work they carried out in their schools on environmental protection during the current year, and they also shared their plan for the next year.

The Conference also had an exhibit of pictures and photographs, and paintings to be judged, in addition to the presentations made by the schools. Prizes for best picture; best photograph and best painting were given. Prizes were also given to students and teachers for their presentations based on the criteria of best team work; best presentation; best theme; best idea and best visual.

‘Wow! Wonderful! Quite amazing!’ is the expression of a tourist or a visitor to Gangtok who enters the Mahatma Gandhi Marg; the main shopping market and centre of tourist attraction in Gangtok which is a ‘pedestrians only’, spit and litter free zone.

But, there is a flip side to this story. The daily waste collected from the City is transported directly to the dumping site. There are no dust bins in the city of Gangtok and the garbage is collected from source by vehicles and is directly moved to the dumping site.

However, the dumping site Martam Landfill Site near Singtam is not managed scientifically and the waste not segregated. Much of the garbage from landfill flows into the Rivers Rani and Teesta. This does not only lead to various health hazards for the people, but to the entire ecosystem surrounding the city.

Taking this cue, CEE Sikkim is working towards the management of solid waste in Gangtok under the project called Supporting Urban Sustainability (SUS). The project adopts an enquiry based approach. During the first SUS Engagement Workshop, held in March 29-30, Gangtok, the following enquiry was framed “How can we together with other stakeholders to collaboratively transform the solid waste management system in and around Gangtok, economically, ethically, and efficiently to conserve the fragile eco system; mitigate animal human conflict, while addressing social justice concerns of waste workers and residents”.

The 7 member team working on the SUS project includes representatives of CEE, Gangtok Municipal Corporation, State Forest Department, and 3 local NGOs - ECOSS, Kanchendzonga Conservation Committee, and The Mountain Institute. The team attended the 5-day International Workshop held at CEE, Ahmedabad from April 26-30 where all the teams working on SUS projects in different parts of India and South Asia came together.

Subsequently, CEE Sikkim has been working on a pilot project called Zero Waste Management in Daragaon, one of the largest wards of the city of Gangtok. This is perhaps the first time that various government agencies, civil society, private and non governmental organizations of Sikkim have joined hands together for a common cause, Zero Waste Management. Later the efforts will be extended to other wards and the entire city of Gangtok and to other towns of the State.

CEE is the ENVIS centre on Environmental Education (EE). As an ENVIS centre, CEE caters to the information needs of environmental educators. Write to the CEE ENVIS Centre at [email protected]

CEE Jaipur in association with Rajasthan State Bharat Scouts and Guides celebrated the Earth Day at Jaipur. The event aimed at sensitizing young minds on the need for positives actions at individual and collective level towards environmental conservation.  The activities kicked off with a rally aimed at raising awareness among the Jaipurites. A movie on climate change was screened followed by a discussion to raise awareness about the impacts of climate change and the need to take steps to mitigate its effects.

A poster making competition helped to bring out the creative persona of the participants and express their green vision. Through slogan writing competition students came up with messages of eco-friendly habits for a safer and more prosperous future, like covering short distance on foot rather than vehicles, conserving forest by using both sides of paper, shutting off electrical appliances when not in use, keeping public spaces clean. An audio-visual environmental quiz was organized on themes ranging from climate change, food, biodiversity, waste management, culture and heritage, water among others.

CEE North organized a programme at Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya, Lucknow to observe the Earth Day. The aim of the programme was to sensitize the students and teachers about the reasons and negative impact of climate change. 72 students and 5 teachers, enthusiastically participated in different activities held during the programme like film show, painting and photography competition.

After a briefing on the Earth day theme, students were given topics “Hamari Dharti Maa aur Hamari Jimedariyan” (Our Earth and our Responsibilities), “Hamari Prathvi 30 Varso Bad” (Our Earth, 30 years from now) and “Prathvi aur Manav” (The Earth and Humans) for the painting competition.  A photography competition was also organized for the participants in which three groups of students were formed and camera was provided to each of the groups. Briefing was done on the uses of camera and the concept of photography to the students. Student clicked the photos by going around the school campus.

Drawing and painting serves as an important tool to observe and express one’s understanding about different aspect of environment. It also attracts large number of students because they are able to portray their artistic ability to use colours with fun. As an effort to channelise this creativity for learning, CEE Western Regional Cell and Bal Bhawan Diu jointly organized a five day ‘Nature Exploration and Painting Workshop’ from April 22- 26 to celebrate Earth Day . The workshop brought together 30 participants, 10 from Rajasthan and Gujarat each, 5 from Daman and 5 from Dadra Nagar Haveli.

Mr. Premjeet Baria, a renowned artist and Director, Bal Bhavan, Diu facilitated the painting workshop. Creative hands-on experience activities like slogan writing, sand sculpturing; nest making were organised along with visits to explore various ecological, cultural and heritage sites of Diu. Quiz and movie screening were the other activities organised during the workshop.  The workshop culminated with distribution of certificate and memento to all the participants.