Dubai: UAE residents joined communities worldwide marking Earth Day on Monday with a series of events to raise awareness on care of the environment.
Earth Day is held on April 22 every year to highlight environmental issues such as sustainable use of resources, recycling, pollution and waste levels, and green technology.
In the UAE, school children held activities with environment themes while officials and corporate leaders supported green initiatives.
Marking the occasion, the Sharjah environmental and waste management company, Bee’ah, organised its second “My Bee’ah Walkathon” to stress the importance of recycling.
The walk was held at Al Qasba and ended at Al Majaz Waterfront in Sharjah, where participants experienced the jogging track made from over 6,000 recycled tyres for the event.
Aiming to educate the community about the different ways of recycling, a number of outdoor activities were organised at the Al Majaz Waterfront for visitors of all age groups.
Meanwhile, Delhi Private School Sharjah held special assemblies and an Art Marathon under the Colours of the Earth theme. Children sat in school corridors to create artworks and made photo frames from used CD covers.
They also planted money plants in recycled bottles and made stationery stands from used cans. Also, portraits of UAE rulers were made by grade five students using recycled materials. All students were given a special Earth Day Badge as a token of their participation.
Meanwhile, it was announced on Earth Day that Dubai-based Emirates Environment Group (EEG) has invited more organisations to participate in its electronics recycling efforts, previously focused on mobile phone recycling.
The EEG programme, initiated and supported by mobile phone maker Nokia since 2009, aims to involve the community in the recycling of unwanted devices like mobile phones and other electronic items.
“EEG’s primary goal is to ensure that these valuable materials are not thrown in the landfills. We want people to know that their old mobile phones lying in their cabinets can be recycled and made into new products to save on precious natural resources — and so can other electronics,” EEG Chairperson Habiba Al Marashi said in a statement.
Ulrike Vott, Sustainability Manager, MEA Nokia, added: “We see it is time for the next step, which is to start dialogue in the country on the sustainable management of waste from electronic and electrical products overall, one of the world’s fastest growing waste streams.
“We therefore strongly encourage other stakeholders from industry, the market and the government to join the dialogue.”
And in Ras Al Khaimah, hotels and tourism entities, in collaboration with Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority (TDA) and Project AWARE Foundation, collectively initiated an emirate-wide drive to clean up and conserve the coastal and desert areas.
Ras Al Khaimah’s four Hilton Worldwide properties led the drive in partnership with Ras Al Khaimah TDA.
The campaign included 22 divers who were able to collect approximately 200kg of rubbish. Tree-planting and other beach and desert clean-up drives were also held by various groups.
