PAMACC News (NAIROBI, Kenya)
Environmental degradation has emerged as a major challenge of the 21st century, threatening communities and increasing poverty. Societies across the globe have continued to suffer from a persistently unfavourable environmental degradation leading to historical climate change disasters especially among vulnearble communties, experts say.
In a fragile global context, innovative ideas are needed more than ever to protect and conserve the environment and fight against the effects of climate change says Erik Solheim, Executive Director, UN Environment.
It is against this backdrop that the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), organised a competition to select the best promising innovative environment projects by young people across the globe. Six projects were finally selected and the winners presented at the ongoing UN Environment general assembly December 5, 2017.
The six winners dubbed « Young Champions of the Earth » according to UNEP officials are talented individuals between the ages of 18 and 30 with promising ideas to protect or restore the environment.
A press release from UNEP notes that the Young Champions were selected by way of an online public vote and the deliberation of a global jury. The six winners selected from over 600 applicants are, Kaya Dorey from Canada, Eritai Kabetwei- Kiribati, Adam Dixon – UK, Liliana Pazmillo - Ecuador, Omer Badokhon - Yemen and Mariama from Burkina – Faso.
Each of the six winners will receive USD 15,000 in seed funding, mentoring, training to help them realize their environmental ambitions.
In a discussion at the award event, the 2017 Young Champions of the Earth shared their innovative ideas geared at creating positive environmental impact.
Panelist at the event highlighted the role of global youth in sustainable development and, more specifically, the ways and means to empower youth in decision making processes and harness their creativity to effect change and fight against growing poverty and youth unemployment..
Erik Solheim, Head of UN Environment and Ellie Goulding, UN Environment's newest Goodwill Ambassador, joined the conversation with emphasis on what it means to be an environmentalist in 2017.
According to UNEP, the selection was very competitive with shortlisted applicants subjected to an online public vote before being considered by a global Jury comprising VICE Media Founder, Suroosh Alvi; She Leads Africa Co-founder, Yasmin Belo-Osagie; UN Environment Head, Erik Solheim; Covestro CEO, Patrick Thomas; and UN Youth Envoy, Jayathma Wickramanayake.
Apart from receiving seed-funding, the winners will also get intensive training, tailored mentorship and global publicity to help them bring their big ideas to life.
Among the winning projects is that of Mariama from Burkina Faso who wants to address the energy deficit in Africa and the devastating degradation of cropland caused by chemical fertilizers. Her project, “JACIGREEN", offers an innovative eco-solution to the problem of water hyacinth, which, she says without controlled management, can be devastating for the environment.
Water hyacinth she says is an invasive alien species that grows very rapidly in the waterways of the Niger River. Although not inherently harmful, initially purifying the waterway in which it grows, water hyacinth becomes a problem once it reaches a certain maturity by suffocating aquatic life. JACIGREEN says she will introduce a plant-based purification mechanism to help manage fresh water sustainably and improve access to drinking water. It will simultaneously implement a system to produce organic fertilizer (via anaerobic composting) and electricity (from biogas recovered from the water hyacinth transformation process).
Another winner Adam Dixon will use horticultural innovation to tackle food insecurity and habitat loss.
What began as an appreciation of gardening from joining his mother while she pottered in the backyard became a fascination with plant growth and a drive for innovation. Dixon’s Phytoponics technology enables food crops to grow in water encased in a 100 percent recyclable polymer film, improving irrigation efficiency and reducing the amount of land use needed for horticulture.
In just one year, Dixon has built his company up to the value of $2.6 million and is supplying Europe's second largest producer of salad. Dixon’s cost-effective, rapidly deployable product is now being piloted by the World Food Programme in refugee camps to support the supply of fresh produce to thousands of people in what are often uncultivable, barren locations.
Canadian fashion designer Kaya Dorey’s unique apparel business not only delivers on sustainability but also an urban street style for a generation wanting to end wasteful consumerism of 'fast fashon'. Her ‘conscious apparel company’, NOVEL SUPPLY Co., produces garments free from toxic dyes and synthetics, and seeks to source hemp and organic cotton as well as environmentally friendly inks. The business is based on the ‘closed-loop’ philosophy of production, which strives for sustainability by improving economic and environmental goals simultaneously.
Ecuadorian biologist Liliana Jaramillo PazmiñI for her part is bringing back flora and fauna and reducing air pollution and vulnerability to natural disasters by encouraging more use of native plants in the green rooftops of our urbanized planet.
Beginning in her native city of Quito, Ecuador’s capital, a towering city with high rates of air pollution that causes inflammatory disease, Liliana has focused her research on identifying and cataloguing which native plant species are better adapted to urban environments and resilient to climate change. As more of the world’s population inhabits dense urban environments, Liliana hopes her research into which plants can best save and serve the environment will be replicated across other urban settings.
She says she dreams of a future where the urban sprawl sees cities bursting with green life across their concrete structures.
Yemeni engineer Omer Badokhon is working on biogas plants which aims to improve thousands of rural livelihoods in his war-stricken homeland. Omer, who holds a degree from Hadhramout University, researched the production and purification of biogas from landfills to generate electricity as part of his studies. He quickly realized that such devices could be put to good use at a domestic level in his country, and set out to do this himself.
The devices, which will be constructed locally under Omer’s guidance, enable the rapid decomposition of domestic organic waste, thereby maximizing the amount of biogas produced. He is working with a non-governmental organization affiliated with the Green Projects Centre to build prototypes and pilot the biogas plants.
Kiribati citizen, Eritai Kateibwi for his work on a hydroponics system that will improve human health and resilience to climate change on the low-lying island. He saw the problems caused by Kiribati’s reliance on imported, often unhealthy, food due to the challenges of growing fresh produce: diabetes, unhealthy children and a garbage problem from dealing with the packaging.
He realized that locally grown, nutritious food would reduce these problems, as well as provide entrepreneurial opportunities to the local communities. Eritai’s system, which relies on Kiribati’s abundant sunshine but uses only 10 per cent of the water of traditional crops, has already been used to produce lettuce, Chinese cabbage and tomatoes within 30 days.
He plans to use the seed financing from the award to build 200 units. Families will receive training and purchase these through micro-financing, the proceeds of which Eritai will use to build and make available more units.
PAMACC News (NAIROBI, Kenya)
The UN Environment Assembly has acknowledged the importance of partnership in driving development actions across the globe .
To this end development stakeholders have decided to walk the talk against pollution with a joint USD 35 Million financial support to the Partnership for Action on Green Economy (PAGE). The financial support came from European Union, Finland, Germany, Norway, the Republic of Korea, Sweden and Switzerland.
The partnership of the five UN agencies is geared at supporting countries in greening their economies and tackling environmental challenges, while promoting better jobs and stable economic growth, according to a press release December 5th 2017 from UNEP
The announcement came at the third UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, attended by over 4,000 heads of state, ministers, business leaders, UN officials and civil society representatives to drive efforts towards a sustainable and pollution free future.
The success of the drive the leaders however noted, hinges on a global alliance of the different development stakeholders, working together for the common good.
“In order to move towards a sustainable and pollution-free future, we need a broad alliance of all stakeholders, one that transcends the traditional divides between industry and environmentalists,” said Jochen Flasbarth, Head of German Delegation and State Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety of Germany.
Delegates echoed their resolve to transform economies into a vehicle for sustainable development through solid alliances.
The EU is committed to cooperating with developing countries, but also to take action domestically, as shown by the ongoing implementation of the circular economy action plan,” said Mr. Daniel Calleja, Director-General for the Environment, European Commission.
The release notes that more than 90 countries have so far benefited from PAGE’s policy reforms at global and national level especially in capacity building.
Accordingly PAGE is supporting policy reforms on sustainable development and a pollution-free planet calling on leaders to increasingly champion growth that reduces and reliance on finite resources.
“As this partnership grows and helps more nations green their economies, we will see leaders increasingly champion sustainable growth that reduces emissions and reliance on finite resources,” said Erik Solheim, Executive Director of UN Environment.
The funding he said will help expand other works that have been done so far. “This new funding will help expand the great work that has been done so far, and move us closer to a pollution-free planet.”
Report from UNEP says environmental degradation overall causes nearly one in four of all deaths worldwide, or 12.6 million people a year, and the destruction of key ecosystems. The ongoing assembly is expected to to examine over a dozen resolutions on the table, including new approaches to tackling air pollution which claims 6.5 million lives annually.
“Making our planet free of pollution could be a new engine of growth, a net generator of green jobs, a new investment opportunity for the finance sector, and a vital strategy for addressing persistent poverty,” said Asad Naqvi, Head of the PAGE Secretariat.
The UN Environment General Assembly accordingly is the world’s highest level environment forum, attended by heads of state, environment ministers, CEO’s of multi-national companies, astronauts, NASA scientists, NGOs, environment ectvisits and other stakeholders to discuss and make global commitments to environmental protection.
It also provides the opportunity to track the latest development in environmental policy and actions by the different actors and exchange on experience.
PAMACC News (NAIROBI, Kenya)
The UN Environment Assembly has acknowledged the importance of partnership in driving development actions across the globe .
To this end development stakeholders have decided to walk the talk against pollution with a joint USD 35 Million financial support to the Partnership for Action on Green Economy (PAGE). The financial support came from European Union, Finland, Germany, Norway, the Republic of Korea, Sweden and Switzerland.
The partnership of the five UN agencies is geared at supporting countries in greening their economies and tackling environmental challenges, while promoting better jobs and stable economic growth, according to a press release December 5th 2017 from UNEP
The announcement came at the third UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, attended by over 4,000 heads of state, ministers, business leaders, UN officials and civil society representatives to drive efforts towards a sustainable and pollution free future.
The success of the drive the leaders however noted, hinges on a global alliance of the different development stakeholders, working together for the common good.
“In order to move towards a sustainable and pollution-free future, we need a broad alliance of all stakeholders, one that transcends the traditional divides between industry and environmentalists,” said Jochen Flasbarth, Head of German Delegation and State Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety of Germany.
Delegates echoed their resolve to transform economies into a vehicle for sustainable development through solid alliances.
The EU is committed to cooperating with developing countries, but also to take action domestically, as shown by the ongoing implementation of the circular economy action plan,” said Mr. Daniel Calleja, Director-General for the Environment, European Commission.
The release notes that more than 90 countries have so far benefited from PAGE’s policy reforms at global and national level especially in capacity building.
Accordingly PAGE is supporting policy reforms on sustainable development and a pollution-free planet calling on leaders to increasingly champion growth that reduces and reliance on finite resources.
“As this partnership grows and helps more nations green their economies, we will see leaders increasingly champion sustainable growth that reduces emissions and reliance on finite resources,” said Erik Solheim, Executive Director of UN Environment.
The funding he said will help expand other works that have been done so far. “This new funding will help expand the great work that has been done so far, and move us closer to a pollution-free planet.”
Report from UNEP says environmental degradation overall causes nearly one in four of all deaths worldwide, or 12.6 million people a year, and the destruction of key ecosystems. The ongoing assembly is expected to to examine over a dozen resolutions on the table, including new approaches to tackling air pollution which claims 6.5 million lives annually.
“Making our planet free of pollution could be a new engine of growth, a net generator of green jobs, a new investment opportunity for the finance sector, and a vital strategy for addressing persistent poverty,” said Asad Naqvi, Head of the PAGE Secretariat.
The UN Environment General Assembly accordingly is the world’s highest level environment forum, attended by heads of state, environment ministers, CEO’s of multi-national companies, astronauts, NASA scientists, NGOs, environment ectvisits and other stakeholders to discuss and make global commitments to environmental protection.
It also provides the opportunity to track the latest development in environmental policy and actions by the different actors and exchange on experience.
PAMACC News
Coalition of women organisations attending the ongoing 3rd United Nations Environmental Assembly (UNEA-3) today urged the global assembly to prioritise the protection of women human rights and environmental defenders.
The women groups under the umbrella of the Women’s Major Group (WMG) made the call at a side event on the challenges facing women’s environmental rights defenders.
“Since the effects of pollution outlive all of us, we want a fast-response civil society advisory committee and the strengthening of UNEP’s safeguards and human rights policies if really we are to leave no one behind,” the women groups said.
Identifying 2017 as the deadliest year for women’s environmental rights defenders, the women called for increased protection of their rights to indigenous land and resource ownership as they face increased crackdowns, violence, threats, intimidation and murder by state and non-state actors.
The Women’s rights group also paid tributes to women who lost their lives this year while highlighting the important role of women rights defenders in creating a pollution-free future.
Helen Hakena, Leitana Nehan Women’s Development Agency, Papua New Guinea said, “We have suffered a 20-year war, which has had a terrible impact on Women.
“62% of the men confessed to having raped women. Even though the war has ended, women still face immense aggression from the conflict of resources on our land, where an international mining company operated the largest open pit mine in the world,” she said.
“The Panguna mine has destroyed and polluted our land, forest, rivers and food sources, and seeps all profits away, Nehan added”
Priscilla Achakpa of the Women’s Major Group revealed that about 200 women’s environmental rights defenders have been assassinated within the past 12 months, mostly killed over land and forest conflicts.
“Only last week, we lost Elisa Badayos from the Philippines. But these conflicts are greatly aggravated by pollution,” Achakpa said
“Pollution is not incidental but a deliberate and inevitable consequence of a profit-oriented economy of mass production of harmful plastics, pesticides, and fossil fuels,” Priscilla Achakpa added.
Apart from this, the WMG chief said Nigerian women are exposed to hazardous chemicals every day.
“Samples of human breast milk obtained from Nigeria were found to have high levels of Persistent Organic Pollutants. A study found over 15,000 metric tonnes of pesticides per year were imported into the country between 1983 -1990,” Achakpa said.
In Kenya, some 5000 people are exposed to Mercury pollution in Artisanal Small-scale Gold Mining sites.
“Mercury is banned under the Minamata Convention, negotiated here at UNEP but in the impoverished community that I’m working with they don’t have much option,” says Griffins Ochieng from the Centre for Environmental Justice and Development (CEJAD), a Kenya based NGO.
“Mining gold and mixing it with mercury is the only knowledge they have and the main source of income. Communities do not have access to information about the hazards of using mercury. We need our government to stop mercury trade,” Ochieng added.
