By: Manoah Kikekon
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| Green Janitors and partner organizations |
Green Janitors sustainable initiative in partnership with the Lagos State Waterways Authority (LASWA), cleaned waterways in Badagry, Lagos State, to commemorate World Environment Day.
Every June 5th, is the date set aside by the U.N. to commemorate World Environment Day. The day falls on a Monday, which is why it was shifted to June 10th, Saturday. The whole world comes together to show the significance of the environment, bearing in mind that the environment harbours everything humans do.
Ashade Abdulsalam Abiodun, executive director of the Green Janitor Sustainable Initiative, said, "This day is to show how we can protect and sustain our environment. This year's theme is beat the plastic pollution, out of which we coined our own theme, which we called from pollution to solutions.
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| Volunteers cleaning Badagry waterways |
"This is to send an advocacy message to the public and to educate the youth on how we can turn pollution into a solution by looking for the best positive way to prevent plastic pollution," he said.
Ashade noted that "we all know that plastics take thousands of years to decompose, and the best way to beat plastic pollution is by going through the three Rs of waste management: reduce, reuse, and recycle. That is the key thing we are trying to preach to the youths here, which is not restricted to the community youths; we are trying our best by spreading our tentacles to campuses, which is why you can see students from various universities."
He also said that "the secret behind gathering these youth is passion and enthusiasm. I try to instill passion in them, and they’re encouraged by the passion they see in me. There are people who came from Lagos Island, Gbagada, and other faraway places despite the conditions of Badagry roads."
Green Janitors carry out consistent advocacy, mostly online and randomly offline, where youths are educated through webinar programmes and seminars organised to train them on how to be creative with plastic as a way for them to create a resource and further make a livelihood.
Ashade added that "we don’t have the needed funds, but we have the needed human resources. So I can tell you, we’ve been able to do this through the efforts of various human resources, i.e., youths out there. We have survived basically on donations."
Engineer Ukeme Sunday, principal marine engineer and head of vessel inspection unit for Lagos State waterways authorities, said, "in line with the international convention for marine pollution, which prohibits the discharge of pollutant into waterways or to the marine environment, of which plastic is also a pollutant.
"Here in Badagry today, we come to sensitise the people, both the locals, boat operators, and passengers, on the effects of dumping plastics into the marine environment, which has adverse effects on aquatic life and boat operations. That is why we are here in collaboration with Green Janitor and other agencies to let people know that cleaner and safer waterways start with us as individuals," he said.