The world as we know it is changing. Glaciers are melting into the sea increasing the water levels while wildlife is heading towards extinction due to their habitats being destroyed and deforestation taking place. In other words, Mother Nature is dying.
With the urban development across the major cities of Sri Lanka, there is a fear of over-dumping of landfills and increased waste pollution. Glass and plastic waste have significantly increased in the recent times. We find a lot of waste comprising of plastic bottles, glass bottles, beverage cans and tins, alcohol containers etc. For how much longer can we do this? For how much longer can we carry on being ignorant of the sheer devastation taking place around us? For how much longer are we going to promise to change our cruel ways and never take up the initiative? Not a second longer was what we decided here at the Rotaract club of Achievers Lanka Business School.
On the 1st of December 2016, the “Go Green Challenge” was launched, with the entire clubs being divided into teams, with a number of eco-friendly and green challenges being launched to be completed within a weeks’ time with the winning team being awarded an exciting prize. This was the brainchild of Rtr. Shalutha and Rtr. Rashmi, (the folks who brought to you Iftar also), who later on handed it over to Rtr. Anushan and Rtr. Naweed due to their busy schedules with other upcoming club projects. Rtr. Anushan and I were given the task of carrying out this project and making sure the whole club was involved and good PR was generated on social media.
Due to the mundane and tedious nature of the project, we had to ensure maximum participation and also create awareness for the project. Rtr.Anushan being the true nerd who came up with a brilliant idea of basing the judging on a point system of likes on social media, which solved the problem of choosing the winner and also creating awareness for the project. Social media went crazy with members of all the teams uploading pictures of the completed challenges and short videos on creating awareness and presenting viable solutions. The outstanding and most commendable part of the project was the sheer commitment shown to the cause by all the members, with the new members and the golden oldies coming together and making things happen. The leadership of each team (A, B, C, D) was given to new members who did a great job with delegation and motivation. I would like to give a special mention to Rtr. Nuwanthi (team B) who did an outstanding job with coordinating, delegating and motivating her members, which eventually led her team to the victory with an outrageous amount of 5086 points.
Following is a small insight to two of our challenges:
During challenge 4 the creativity that was within the club was displayed with members of various teams coming up with beautiful and very artsy creations, that were created using waste items such as plastic bottles etc. and turning them into handy items. Out of all of them, the most creative and beautiful items belonged to Rtr. Kamesha who did the beautiful wall hanging out of old plastic spoons, origami paper, and oil paints and not to forget Rtr. Randima who made a chic pencil holder with googly eyes and frills, all items being so creative that they were store worthy.
Challenge 6 saw members of all teams doing a short video on four topics provided to each team and then posting on social media giving a new dimension to the project pushing beyond just a status or a picture and a hashtag by voicing their diverse opinions and what they as individuals saw as solutions for the problems we are facing. This also drove members to get past their fear of talking and voicing opinions on public forums and letting their ideologies be given a voice.
All in all, it was a good project with all members enjoying brownies at the end of the project, courtesy of Madam President, Rtr. Maneesha, due to the combined effort is taken to come together as a club and create awareness as well as create a better tomorrow, because when we make tomorrow a cleaner and greener day it is not one team that wins but all of us in society as a whole! I encourage all other clubs to adopt this “Go Green” challenge to create awareness of all the devastation taking place and to try and change our ways to create a better, cleaner, greener tomorrow. Because at the end of the day, it’s for our own survival and we need to leave a clean and healthy planet for all the generations to come.
We hope this initiative of ours goes a long way as the time has come to stop thinking and start doing and hopefully, more clubs will adopt this initiative and make tomorrow a better, cleaner and greener day.
#UniteToIgnite
Rtr. Naweed Niyas,
Co-Chairperson.
Editor
RACALBS