Themed as Green Voices for this year’s conference, the one-day event at Discovery College, Discovery Bay, was to have students from 12 ESF member schools to brainstorm potential campaigns in raising environmental awareness in Hong Kong.
Guest of honour, Ms. Christine Loh, Under Secretary for the Environment HKSAR, took the stage as the Chief Judge for students’ work on various campaign ideas in raising environmental awareness. Ms. Loh’s insights in the environmental policy developments of Hong Kong gave students an unprecedented insight into how decision makers tackle some of the very challenging questions in promoting conservation in Hong Kong, such as the domestic waste recycling programme.
Keynote speaker, Dr. Andy Cornish, former Director of the WWF Hong Kong, spoke about his campaign experiences around the total ban of trawl fishing in Hong Kong under his directorship between 2005-2012.
Dr. Willie Smits was the keynote speaker in the 6th Annual ESF Environmental Conference
Dr. Willie Smits, keynote speaker in the 6th Annual ESF Environmental Conference was also present at this year ‘s conference.
Students from one of Masarang HK’s partner schools, the Victoria Shanghai Academy (VSA), also took part in this event and presented ideas on school greening. This included the utilization of a slope behind the school for tree planting for education and vertical greening on school buildings.
Teams from other schools presented ideas on reducing food waste in school, banning shark fins, recycling plastic in consumer products and reducing air pollution.
The participating schools at this year’s conference included:
- Kennedy School (microbits),
- Shatin Junior School (plastic products),
- Discovery College (Shark Fins),
- Renaissance College (Food Waste),
- Clearwater Bay School (Shark Fins),
- Kowloon Junior High (Food Waste),
- Glenealy School (plastics),
- Quarry Bay School (Air Pollution),
- Beacon Hill School (Food Waste),
- Peak School (Ivory),
- Victoria Shanghai Academy (Air Pollution),
- Bradbury School (Food Waste).
You can find more information at the ESF website and ESF Facebook.
]]>
China’s developing economy and need for lots of resources from abroad have great impact on my country. Coal, palm oil, rubber, etc., all of these products are impacting nature’s survival in Indonesia in ways that do not benefit the wildlife. I believe, in the long-term, their impact will also be negative for the local people.
In the lecture, the Crown Princess, head of the Yogyakarta Nature Conservation Foundation, spoke about the ongoing drive to save Indonesia’s forests and primates, in particular in Borneo. The Foundation runs a large animal rescue and environmental education centre near Yogyakarta. The Princess’s work has a particular emphasis on educating youth about the environment, especially though the DeforestAction, a charity which is connecting 10 million children with efforts to save Borneo’s forests and primates.
Dr. Smits, who previously lectured at the Society has been working in the Indonesian jungles for over 30 years, especially on reforestation. Dr. Smits talked about the primates of Borneo, including orangutans, and the challenges they are facing to survive in a shrinking and fragmented forest environment. Dr. Smits also spoke about the issues of saving the forests themselves, to conserve entire ecosystems.
The Foundation runs a large animal rescue and environmental education center near Yogyakarta. The center is planning the construction of the orangudome, the world’s most advanced facility for study of orangutan behavior for those orangutans that cannot be returned to the wild. The center will feature many innovative designs that provide visitors a non intrusive view of the orangutan live in the giant open dome where orangutans are provided with choices to decide where to go with what other orangutans and to interact through games that enrich their lives with people around the world.
The orangudome is part of the DeforestAction project to connect 10 million children with on the ground work for saving Borneo’s forests and the orangutans using 21st century learning skills and techniques. Dr. Smits also addressed sustainability issues in relation to the indigenous Dayak people who inhabit most of Borneo, who are also dependent on the forests. He spoke of the issues of forest ecology and forest restoration. This includes not just how to make forests into sustainable sun energy capture devices, but also how approaches, involving mixed sugar palm forests and agroforestry, might be a solution to dealing with climate change.
The following day Dr. Smits visited the orangutans in the HK Zoological and Botanic Gardens. See the interview he gave with the South China Morning Post
[vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/35422761 w=400&h=225]