Today is World Oceans Day

Make the Ocean Promise

June 8th is World Oceans Day! On World Oceans Day, people around the planet celebrate and honor the body of water which links us all, for what it provides humans and what it represents. Be a part of this growing global celebration! Make your promise now via the World Oceans Day website @ http://bit.ly/ocean_promise

Celebrating World Environment Day on 5 June 2013

Think.Eat.Save.

The theme for this year’s World Environment Day celebrations is Think.Eat.Save. Think.Eat.Save is an anti-food waste and food loss UNEP - United Nations Environment Programme campaign that encourages you to reduce your foodprint. 

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), every year 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted. This is equivalent to the same amount produced in the whole of sub-Saharan Africa. At the same time, 1 in every 7 people in the world go to bed hungry and more than 20,000 children under the age of 5 die daily from hunger. 

Given this enormous imbalance in lifestyles and the resultant devastating effects on the environment, this year’s theme – Think.Eat.Save – encourages you to become more aware of the environmental impact of the food choices you make and empowers you to make informed decisions. While the planet is struggling to provide us with enough resources to sustain its 7 billion people (growing to 9 billion by 2050), FAO estimates that a third of global food production is either wasted or lost. 

Food waste is an enormous drain on natural resources and a contributor to negative environmental impacts. This year’s campaign rallies you to take action from your home and then witness the power of collective decisions you and others have made to reduce food waste, save money, minimize the environmental impact of food production and force food production processes to become more efficient. If food is wasted, it means that all the resources and inputs used in the production of all the food are also lost. 

For example, it takes about 1,000 litres of water to produce 1 litre of milk and about 16,000 litres goes into a cow’s food to make a hamburger. The resulting greenhouse gas emissions from the cows themselves, and throughout the food supply chain, all end up in vain when we waste food. In fact, the global food production occupies 25% of all habitable land and is responsible for 70% of fresh water consumption, 80% of deforestation, and 30% of greenhouse gas emissions. It is the largest single driver of biodiversity loss and land-use change. 

Making informed decision therefore means, for example, that you purposefully select foods that have less of an environmental impact, such as organic foods that do not use chemicals in the production process. Choosing to buy locally can also mean that foods are not flown halfway across the world and therefore limit emissions. So think before you eat and help save our environment! Know more at http://www.unep.org/wed/

Green Coalition - Bessy Beach Cleanup 2011

550 Kgs of Beach Trash Combed in 3 Hours!

Green Coalition Network partnered with Times of India and Garnier for the "Bessy Beach Cleanup" on July 24, 2011. This was the only officially endorsed "Take Care Take Charge" environment day event in Chennai, India and was held at the Elliots Beach in Besant Nagar between 6 AM and 9 AM.

More than 500 volunteers across different age groups participated in the Beach cleanup. This included school and college students, corporate staff, beach patrons besides members, interns and volunteers of Green Coalition Network and other NGOs which ensured the clean up was a great success. A special mention to the AVM Rajeswari School since they enthusiastically contributed over 200 students for the cleanup besides the CSR sponsors - Logica, Royal Sundaram Insurance and Ideasonic Studios.

Armed with protective hand gloves, caps, recyclable trash bags and jute sacks, each of our volunteer removed an estimated one KG each of trash from the beach sands, the shore and the beach roads. Some of our more active volunteers individually collected over 5 kgs each! Plastic, paper, cigarette butts, straws, thermocol, styrofoam, footwear, glass, food wrappers, metal objects, wood chunks besides odd surprises like broken helmets, old tires, floppy disks and a significant amount of clothing trash were combed from the beach area.

Approximately 550 Kgs of trash and marine debris was collected, brought to the shore and kept aside with regular garbage for collection by the Chennai Corporation conservancy dept. This is an impressive achievement considering the cleanup started before sunrise with an inclement rain soaked weather the previous night and some of our volunteers being absolute first-timers. Awareness lectures and distribution of leaflets were also organised for the benefit of the student volunteers and the local citizenry at the beach. This incidentally was the second beach cleanup organised by Green Coalition this year.

You can view the event pics on the official Take Care Take Charge Facebook community page or the Green Coalition Facebook page.