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Small
Hands join to ‘CLEAN’ Bangalore |
Launched in 1999 with three schools, CLEAN-Bangalore has now grown in strength by five more schools joining the network. While the first two years focused mainly on training children on environmental quality monitoring and creating awareness, during the third year, children have taken active interest to make things happen on ground. It is worth discussing some of the efforts taken by the children in initiating environment improvement programmes in their respective schools.
Before discussing the action programmes, it must be mentioned that water quality monitoring for three seasons was conducted on schedule, with children from all the eight schools. To give the reader an overview of the results - it was noticed that municipal water samples from most of the zones (Bangalore is divided into ten geographic zones and the eight schools cover eight different zones) were generally free from contamination, although some water samples did show presence of faecal coliform. Many ground water samples showed nitrate and bacterial contamination. The quality of the surface water bodies, the ‘beautiful’ lakes in Bangalore, were terrible in all respects - foul smell, high content of nitrates & phosphorous and invariably very low dissolved oxygen content. ‘Beauty’ that adorned the city long ago, these lakes have now become sewage dumps and an ‘eye sore’ for the people in Bangalore.
The most important aspect of this year’s activity was the active
involvement of children in initiating action programmes in schools. Student and
teacher representatives from six schools were trained in Vermicomposting (a
method by which organic waste is converted into nutrient -rich manure with the
help of earthworms) during the month of December, 2000. Two schools had already
initiated this activity and students from one of the schools - Centre for
Learning, shared their experiences with the rest of the schools. In a matter of
a few weeks after the workshop, four other schools showed interest in initiating
vermicomposting and concrete tanks were built in these schools with the help of funds from Association for India’s Development. Students
would collect organic wastes from their canteen, garden and playground and
initiate the vermicomposting process after the summer vacation.
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Plastics Living in Bangalore for the past eleven years we have noticed
a very dramatic change in the amount of plastic being used. It has gone up
exponentially. Where do they go? Flapping on bushes, floating on lakes,
colouring the streets of Bangalore in an indiscriminate manner, but that is not
what we want, do we? What we want is a plastic free Bangalore. This will
hopefully inspire the people of Bangalore to be aware of the usage of plastic.
All people of Bangalore must take immediate action to reduce the amount of
plastic being used. |
Apart from the above-mentioned activities, a few medicinal
plants were distributed to each school for initiating a herb corner. A CLEAN-Bangalore
Newsletter was also started. This newsletter has provided a medium for children
and people from the community to express their views and efforts on making
Bangalore City as ‘CLEAN’ as they can.
CLEAN - Bangalore is making all efforts to include more schools and at least two Resident Welfare Associations during this academic year. Some of the new activities planned for this year in addition to vermicomposting and medicinal plant conservation include:
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- Initiation of air quality monitoring and tree census. - Exposure visits to natural parks, sanctuaries, industries, etc. - Action programmes including tree planting, rainwater harvesting and initiation of an environment resource centre at each school. A CLEAN - Bangalore meet is planned during this academic year. We hope that children from schools in Bangalore and from other parts of South India would share their experiences in making their surroundings ‘Clean’ and ‘Green’. Iq
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‘Plant trees’ |
