Abu Dhabi: A 19-year-old Emirati has attempted to get Zayed University (ZU) into the Guinness World Records.
On Thursday, Zayed University students led by Mariam Al Hallami attempted to break the Guinness World Record by gathering 394kg of plastic bottles, exceeding the previous record of 298kg.
Guinness World Records is yet to confirm whether the previous record has been broken.
From 8:30am until 4:30pm, the students were busy sorting out over 70 giant-size trash bags filled with around 35,000 plastic bottles that will be recycled by Tadweer in Dubai.
"Since my childhood I was fascinated by Guinness and wanted to enter one day and I knew I could do it," Mariam, the Student Council President, told Gulf News.
"This is my last year as a Student Council President and I wanted to leave a legacy behind me while benefiting the society. I wanted to break the world record of recycled newspapers but got the approval from Guinness for plastic bottles instead, so I announced it to my peers and here we are," she added.
Nine witnesses from several community institutions like Emirates Environmental Group, Emirates Identity Authority, the French Embassy, and the Family Development Foundation supervised the process ensuring integrity and clean record.
Azza Ahmad, a student council member, said: "We are very concerned by the environment; we know that UAE produces a lot of waste and we wanted to make better use of this waste."
Dr Sulaiman Al Jasem, ZU Vice-President, told Gulf News :"We encourage and support the students raising awareness, that we should all work together to save the environment. Today's students will be tomorrow's leaders, that's the place where we should start," he said.
