Youths and Children Unite for a Green Nepal

Other than the fact that it is a UNESCO World Heritage site, Basantapur is special for many other reasons. There are many stories associated with this area and it has made history in the country. There have been political gatherings in Basantapur, leaders have given provoking speeches and many a times changed the course of the nation. Thousands of people have gathered there on different occasions; sometimes the reason was political, sometimes social and sometimes religious. But on June 5, thousands of youths came together to mark a different type of occasion—the World Environment Day 2009.

Heartbeat and Environment Organizations (EnvOrgs), an alliance of five different organizations— Green.Society,  Orbit Youth for Change, Tourism for Development Endeavors (TUDE), Yatra, and Youth Engagement in Sustainability (YES) Nepal— that are working to create an environmentally healthy and sustainable Nepal organized the event with a host of activities involving youth and children. 

This year’s theme is, Your Planet Needs You—Unite to Combat Climate Change and the event aimed to inspire all to get involved, rethink actions and ways that result in reduction of wastage, heavy greenhouse emissions and adopt a greener lifestyle. The theme also reflects the urgency for nations to ‘seal the deal’ at the crucial climate convention meeting in Copenhagen in December of this year. In the convention, some 190 governments will meet to negotiate a comprehensive global climate agreement for the period after 2012, when the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol expires.

United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon, in his message to mark the World Environment 2009 said, “While all countries will suffer, the poor will bear the brunt of the impact.” This revelation certainly puts countries like ours on to-be-the-hardest-hit list. Realizing that everyone has a role to play in reducing the threat that climate change poses to peace, security, sustainable development and quality of life, Niraj Tamrakar, program coordinator of the event, shared that the major objectives of the program was to raise awareness on environment issues, and to encourage youth and children to participate in conserving the environment. 

Basantpur was bustling with different activities that the organizers had planned for the event. There were activities ranging from Globe Making Competition, to Community Theatre and Installation Art. Students from 17 colleges and five schools participated in the globe-making competition, in which they presented two globes—one depicting the damaged earth because of environmentally unhealthy practices of human beings, and the other showing the beautiful earth which could be created if everybody worked to make this world a better place to live in. Ace College of Management and Rosebud School won the competition for their innovative and conceptually sound ideas. 

One of the major attractions of the program was the Installation Art, or what the organizers preferred calling Performance Art. “Plastic” and “Nature” were the subjects of the theme, where artists Juju, Suda, Renu, Suraj and Uma from Heartbeat tried to raise awareness about the negative impacts of the use of plastic, and encouraged the use of organic materials. The installation reflected and showed human shadow and its relationship with human beings from birth till death. 

A young group of theatre artists from Dabali, an institute promoting Community Theatre, gave a wonderful performance on the urgency to act to protect the Mother Earth. Another young group of school students gave a hilarious, yet message-driven performance with the theme Modern Ramayana with a lot of interesting twists and turns. The performance not only gave quite a good laughs, but also urged the crowd to use environmentally-friendly products and processes in their daily lives.

The “Planet Police” also captured the attention of passer-bys.  A group of six students dressed in costumes designed by using waste materials went around Basantapur distributing pamphlets and making people aware about the need to be planet friendly. 

Art with Celebrities, where children and celebrities worked together to create works of art focusing on environment issues, was the highlight of the event. Mahesh Shakya, actor, who debuted in Sano Sansaar (Nepali movie), along with the children created beautiful paintings.

After wrapping up the event at Basantapur, around 50 individuals from the member organizations headed to Lapsi Phedi, 22 kilometers east of Kathmandu, to conduct the second round of events. Lapsi Phedi, with its unique Tamang culture, is an emerging tourist destination and also the source for Salinadi, one of the religious rivers joining the Bagmati River. The objective of the program was two-fold: to raise awareness among local people about environment issues and to bridge the rural-urban youth divide for tourism promotion and conservation of the environment.  

The group stayed at Lapsi Phedi for the night and engaged themselves in community work, which primarily focused on local environment conservation and awareness. The team mingled with the local community and youths to get information about local environmental issues and developed strategies to promote the area as an eco-tourism destination. Both the team and the local people teamed up for a clean-up of the wetland at Lapsi Phedi to raise awareness on the importance of wetlands, and committed themselves to conserve the wetlands by working together. 

The program was a wonderful initiation by Heartbeat and EnvOrgs, and it was successful in creating the momentum. However, as cliché as it may sound, showing our concern toward environment and climate change for just a single day will not make a lot of difference—we need to work towards the cause 365 days, and help build a healthier world.

Photographs provided by Tourism for Development Endeavors (TUDE).