Sunday, January 18, 2009

DM honours participants of Clean Up campaign


Eng. Hussain Nasser Lootah, Director General of Dubai Municipality said it is important to incorporate the principle of cooperation and joint coordination among establishments as far as environmental matters are concerned.
"It is also important to activate the participation of individuals in environmental programmes and activities organized by the Municipality to create environmental awareness among different categories of the public towards major environmental issues that concern the whole society," he said.
Lootah was speaking at a ceremony held at Grand Hyatt Hotel last week to honour the sponsors and participants of Clean Up the World 2008 campaign organized by the Municipality during 18 - 21 November last year with the participation of nearly 20,000 volunteers, who collected more than 4,150 tonnes of waste.
The ceremony was also attended by Eng. Abdullah Rafia, Assistant Director General for Environmental and Public Health Services Sector, Eng. Hassan Makki, Director of Waste Management Department and Head of the Campaign Team, Yaqoub Al Ali, Coordinator of the Campaign and a number of senior officials of the Municipality, in addition to representatives of local government departments and private establishments, NGOs, and people of different nationalities who participated in the campaign.
Those who were honoured in the ceremony included the main sponsors Al Naboodah, Al Habtoor Group, Zenath Recycling & Waste Management LLC, Gulf Eternit Industries and Grand Hyatt.
Lootah said the strategic objectives the Municipality had placed for this campaign have been achieved by huge public participation. "The campaign has become a platform for practical cooperation between establishments and individuals concerned with environment inside and outside the Municipality. The participation of people is increasing year after year, especially the support of the Federal Ministry of Environment and Water was vital in the success of the programmes," he said.
Lootah pointed out that the number of participants rose to 20,000 this time, which was only 200 in 1993. "We had a wide range of participation from different walks of life, among them the most notable was the participation of more than 6,500 students from the government and private schools in the emirate," he said.
Lootah said the support of the media was very significant as the different channels of media and the newspapers gave extensive coverage to the event.
During the ceremony he also launched a special website for the campaign called www.cleanuptheworld.dm.ae.
Hassan Makki said the campaign, inaugurated by the Minister of Environment and Water Dr. Ahmed Rashid Bin Fahd at Shindagha Heritage Village on November 18, focused on creating awareness among the young generation on protecting environment as well as enhancing knowledge on environment and pollution so that children become leaders in the future qualified to carry on the task of awareness creation.
He said that this year 6,500 students from 79 government schools and 31 private schools participated the Clean Up The World campaign. "In addition, more than 12,650 volunteers representing 309 private companies and 16 local departments participated in the activities of the campaign. Construction companies contributed by transporting more than 3,000 tonnes of clean sand to fill up the ground at beaches," he said.
Makki said the participation of different nationalities, especially Indians and Filipinos, was highly significant in the success of the campaign.
Yaqoub Al Ali noted that the campaign was associated with a number of awareness programmes on different environmental issues, especially throwing litter. "The awareness programmes included workshops on reducing and recycling waste, collection of used items from employees, painting on environment, Market for bags in place of plastic, workshop for making useful things from waste, information leaflets, radio contests, lectures and workshops in schools, field visits for students to recycling factories, in addition to photography contests in coordination with Filipino Photographers Association," he said.

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