Samoa encouraged to join national clean-up effort on Saturday

27 October 2016, 12:00AM

This Saturday, volunteers across Upolu, including Miss Samoa, Pricilla Olano, will be participating in Samoa National Clean-up Day.

Samoa National Clean-up Day is hosted by Samoa’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (M.N.R.E) with support from PacWaste - a €7.85 million project funded by the European Union and implemented by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (S.P.R.E.P) to improve regional hazardous waste management across the Pacific.

To promote the upcoming clean-up day, staff from M.N.R.E and S.P.R.E.P visited St. Theresa Primary School in Lepea last week.

Around 60 students from Years 5 and 6 heard presentations on the importance of keeping rubbish out of rivers and oceans. Students were also encouraged to adopt ‘Smart choices for a cleaner and safer Pacific’ - a range of simple actions that contribute to reduced waste and increased resilience.

Samoa National Clean-up Day will be held on Saturday 29 October between 8am and 11am targeting three areas, Fuluasou River, Sogi Mangroves and Mulinuu Mangroves.

Malaki Iakopo, A.C.E.O of Water Resources Division from M.N.R.E explains that the clean-up is a key event to in the lead-up to Samoa national environment week which begins on Monday 31 October. 

“The clean-up event is aimed at engaging government and communities and encouraging all of us to take action and responsibility for our environment,” he said. 

“In addition, the rubbish collected during the event will be counted and recorded and used to inform both the public and government.”

 PacWaste Project Officer, Elizabeth Vanderburg, said that the clean-up day is a great way to promote the importance of a cleaner and safer Samoa.

“S.P.R.E.P and the European Union are very pleased to be supporting this clean-up event through the PacWaste project,” she said. 

“If we want to see entrenched hazardous waste management practices, an important starting point is to change our mindsets when we deal with any kind of waste – whether it is green waste in our gardens, household waste in our rubbish bins and debris in our rivers and oceans.”

27 October 2016, 12:00AM
Samoa Observer

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