The Daily Star - Families urged to get outdoors for Earth Day - April 23, 2011

By Simona Sikimic
The Daily Star

BEIRUT: Parents should let their children play outdoors or take trips to the countryside over the long weekend and upcoming school holidays to raise environmental awareness, green campaigners said Friday on occasion of Earth Day.
“Letting children play in green spaces is the best environment for them to have fun and be creative, while learning to appreciate their natural surroundings,” said Sara Obeid, a campaigner with the local NGO Greenline.
“Working with children is like planting trees for the future because they will grow up to enact the laws that we are working to establish.”
Founded in 1970 by a U.S. lawmaker keen to improve coordination between government agencies, civil society groups and the public, Earth Day has now spread to 192 countries and is used as an opportunity attract attention to pressing environmental issues.
It is also advanced as a change for people to “do something small but sustainable in their own lives to improve the planet's health, from switching to compact fluorescent light bulbs to reducing the use of pesticides and other toxic chemicals,” U.S.-based organizers said Friday.
Although activities for school children, such as tree planting, were scheduled by several NGOs Friday, the timing of the 2011 Easter holiday meant many events had to be postponed until early May.
An interactive workshop, organized by the U.S. Embassy and the Association for Forest Development and Conservation, did take place Thursday at the Aley Cultural Secondary School, where children performed a play about fire prevention and participated in training a demonstration, involving a fire truck.
The delay, however, should not be used as an excuse to waste time, activists said.
“It is down to individual behavior and it is not enough to have the government taking the actions because, even when they do, a lot rests on the opinions and the actions of individuals,” said Vahakn Kabakian, the head of the Environment Ministry-run National Communication to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Project.
“Planting trees and taking environmental excursions have been vital in spreading awareness among the young in the last few years,” he said. “If we keep hammering at people daily we will eventually get through to them.”
Environmental degradation including underground water pollution and waste water treatment are considered major problems in Lebanon, with the country falling seriously behind on its U.N. Millennium Development Goal commitment of “achieving environmental sustainability” and “significantly reducing the rate of biodiversity loss” by 2015.
“Most civilizations in history have stopped existing because of environmental reasons,” said Wael Hmaidan, executive director of, IndyAct an umbrella organization of green activists.
“Leading an environmental life style is not an option anymore. It is a fact … if we want to insure the same quality of life for future generations. Environmental sustainability should be part of the youth’s education.”