Articles
Green efforts
Innovation in the environmental domain has become a key priority for the UAE's society, especially when it comes to raising awareness among its youth.
- By Amelia Naidoo, Notes Reporter
- Published: 00:07 May 18, 2008
- Image Credit: Vazhisojan/Gulf News
- The Indian High School, Dubai, students show their project to Formula three driver Basil Shaaban at the Shell Better Environment Awards event.
Innovation in the environmental domain has become a key priority for the UAE's society, especially when it comes to raising awareness among its youth. For this reason Shell, in an initiative with the UAE Ministry of Education, has been running the Shell Better Environment Awards for 12 years. Under this, creative student projects on health, safety and the environment (HSE) are recognised.
At the awards ceremony held recently, Abdullah Musabah, General Director of the Ministry of Education said: "The Shell Better Environment Awards has brought forward a real opportunity to develop social and collective work for a rising young generation."
Six categories
Eighteen schools recently competed for first prize in six categories: Safety at Home, Road Safety, Global Warming, Energy, Obesity and Smoking. Students were informed about the themes last October so that they could apply to be shortlisted to receive funding for their projects.
Officials from the Ministry of Education, Shell, Zayed International Prize for the Environment, Dubai Health Authority and international experts oversaw the various educational zones' preparations.
At the awards ceremony, students had organised an exhibition to display their projects.
Immense benefits
Participant Eleanor Almeida from The Indian High School, Dubai, said the event was "an experience of great benefit, instilling in us and in our youth, a sense of awareness, the beginning ... of a culture of collaboration and care for the environment and the ecosystem that we live in".
She commented that from "research work to presentations to programmes to campaigning and surveys around Dubai, this project has influenced us as global citizens to face the crisis head on and make as many people as possible aware of this issue of global warming".
An ecstatic Obaida Huwair of Al Majd Model School, whose team won in the Environment (energy) category, said they were able to achieve the ranking through hard work and the continuous support of teachers who are involved in their environment and science club.
"They motivated us to learn more about this subject and spread awareness amongst our peers especially," Obaida said.
Shell BEA winners
High school teams competed for first prize in six categories that dealt with health, safety and the environment. The winners are:
- Environment (energy): Al Majd Model School, Sharjah
- Environment (global): The Indian High School, Dubai
- Safety (road safety): Al Sarouj Secondary, Al Ain
- Safety (in the home): Om Hakim Al Ansarya School, Fujairah
- Health (obesity): Al Zohor Private School, Sharjah
- Health (smoking): Al Hamham Secondary, Ras Al Khaimah
Speed fanatic promotes safety first
Formula three racing driver Basil Shaaban was clearly the star of the Shell Better Environment Awards event with students giving him rapturous applause when he spoke on road safety issues.
The company is a premier sponsor partner of his SHAABAN2F1 programme and has sponsored him in the Formula 3 Euro Series in 2007 and 2008.
For the uninitiated, Formula three, or F3, is a class of open-wheel formula racing. With championships around the world, it is an important stepping stone for many prospective F1 drivers.
Shell is also partnering with Shaaban in his Middle East Road Safety campaign. "We are very serious about increasing awareness and helping to reduce one of the world's highest traffic injury and mortality rates that is unfortunately found in the Arab world," the racer said.
Shaaban has been informing students about how more than 1.2 million people die each year from road-related incidents with 35 million people being injured every year.
Traffic deaths are the number one killer in the ages of 10 to 25 and a 25-year-old dies every 82 seconds on our roads. "That's over 1,000 young deaths on our roads every single day!" Shaaban said.
With speeding a leading cause of fatalities and injuries, Shaaban said young men in particular have a tendency to go at excessive speeds. "This is why, alongside being a racing driver, I was motivated to become an ambassador for road safety to set an example that speed is for specific places like go-kart circuits and racing circuits and not for public roads where people get killed."
The use of mobile phones also delays reaction time and increases the risk of collision by 300 per cent, he added.
Basil Shaaban in a nutshell:
Birthday: March 27, 1980
Birthplace: Beirut, Lebanon
Education: Bachelor degree in Astrophysics, University of California Berkeley
Hobbies: Racing in his mind, fitness training, go carting, listening to his favourite band U2, playing the guitar, keyboards or drums and scuba diving.
Sports: Running, cycling, rowing, swimming, endurance weight training and yoga. His greatest love is motorsport but he also does tennis, track and field, skiing, rock climbing and surfing.
Inspirational athletes: The late three-time F1 champion Ayrton Senna, the seven-time F1 champion Michael Schumacher, and the seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.
— Source: www.basilshaaban.com
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