While celebrating the Earth Day with zeal, students of various city schools gave this message to all those at the helms of affairs.
Over 50 schools from 18 towns of the city put on display many hand-made project models and paintings at an exhibition organized by the Sindh Environmental Protection Agency at Playland, Clifton, on Monday.
Students through their exhibits highlighted different issues relating to degradation of environment and depletion of earthy resources and called for an action to save the planet earth from further destruction and make it a cleaner, healthier and more prosperous even for the generations to come.
The earth day is celebrated the world over to revive the pledge of mankind, which was formally made by a group of Americans in 1970, to protect the planet earth from further destruction and deterioration.
Though students are amateur and raw in their presentations, the spirit behind the celebrations would go a long way, said a senior teacher.
What we have done is the outcome of our two or three days hectic effort and limited funding (mostly pocket money), said a girl student at a Saddar town school stall, adding if they were given sufficient time and money, they could have produced better exhibits and floated more ideas and issues concerning the citizens.
However, students mentioned that the EPA show have given them a big exposure and hopefully authorities visiting the stalls should also care for the proposals from students.
The students stressed for more plantation, proper disposal of liquid and solid waste, check on vehicular emission, shifting of factories and mills from the residential areas and measures ensuring proper conservation of water resources.
At one stall it was urged that flour mills be eliminated from residential areas as they were spreading flour carelessly in the air, which finally reached nearby houses carrying other hazardous particles and mostly inhaled by children and women.
A majority of stalls were set up by students of government boy and girls school. The stalls were set up by Government Girls Secondary School, President House, DHA School, Government Boys Secondary School, Sir Syed Town, Government Girls Secondary Pilot School, Nazimabad and Govt Girls Secondary School, Drigh Colony No-5.
The boys and girls along with their teachers had reported for the exhibition in the morning. They were also given a free entry pass of the Playland for the day where they not only enjoyed free rides.
Speaking at the award distribution ceremony of the Earth Day celebrations, Sindh Minister for Finance Abdul Hafiz Shaikh said that damages done to the earth planet during the last 100 years had no example in its early 4 billion years history. He said that people on the earth should turn wiser and friendly to the earth as it was the only way to live here befittingly.
He said like other parts of the world Sindh was also faced with sea pollution, depletion of wetlands and different kinds of pollution.
The director-general of Sindh EPA Shafiq A Khuso said that the major environmental problems in the province were air pollution, solid waste effluents and degradation of natural resources.
He informed the audience that the EPA had placed three proposals before the planning and development department for an improvement in environment.
The secretary of Sindh Wildlife and Environment department, Shamsul Haq Memon, and Executive District Officer (Education), Prof Muhammad Raees Alvi, also spoke on the occasion.
They appreciated the students for their efforts and said that they had contributed a lot towards the furtherance of awareness about earth and environment.
Earlier, the Sindh finance minister, along with the educational officers and EPA officers, visited the stalls and heard from the students about their projects and proposals.
Five city towns were given awards for best stalls set up by schools of their jurisdiction, which are as follows: Saddar town, Liaquatabad Town, Lyari Town, Malir Town and Jamshed Town.
Meanwhile, about 300 saplings were planted at Sandspit and other selective sites near the World Wide Fund’s wetland centre on Monday, in connection with the Earth day celebration.
World Wide Nature for Pakistan celebrated 32nd Earth day with Lever Brothers Pakistan at the wetland centre. The director general of WWF-Pakistan, Dr Ejaz Ahmed, briefed a group of 28 volunteers involved in the mangrove plantation about the Fund’s working in Pakistan and its role in conservation and dissemination of information about environmental issues and about importance of mangrove forests in the coastal ecosystem.