Subject: INFOTERRA: UNEP Global 500 Awards
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UNEP News Release
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MAYOR OF MOSCOW, AMONG 23 INDIVIDUALS AND ORGANIZATIONS
TO RECEIVE UNITED NATIONS ENVIRONMENT AWARD
AT WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY CELEBRATIONS IN MOSCOW
NAIROBI, 25 May 1998 -- The United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP) announced today that 23 individuals and organizations from 19
countries have been elected to the prestigious ranks of its Global
500 Roll of Honour, for their outstanding contributions to the
protection of the environment.
Each of these success stories will be officially recognized on
5 June 1998 at a special award ceremony in Moscow. The event, hosted
by UNEP, the City of Moscow and the Russian Federation, is part of
this year's World Environment Day celebrations.
Among the laureates who will receive their award from UNEP's
Executive Director, Mr. Klaus Toepfer, are: Aga Akbar, a zookeeper
from Afghanistan who lived 18 terrible months on the front lines
rather than abandon his charges; Mike Anane, a journalist from Ghana
whose gutsy articles brought to the fore the alarming rate of
environmental destruction in his country; Sylvia Earle of the United
States of America for her lifelong commitment to deep sea
exploration; Yasuo Goto a business leader from Japan for making the
environment an integral part of his company's policies; Greening
Australia for rehabilitating the country's vegetation; Jae-Bum Kim of
the Republic of Korea for his unwavering commitment to educating
young people about the environment; Feodor Konyukhov, an
environmental globetrotter from the Russian Federation, who only uses
environment-friendly modes of transport to promote the sustainable
use of the Earth's resources; Yuri Luzhkov, Mayor of the City of
Moscow, for his commitment to sustainable urban development; Yongshun
Ma, a retired lumberman from the People's Republic of China, who has
devoted the last part of his life to planting trees; and Don Merton
of New Zealand for devising methods to improve the survival of
bird species facing extinction.
The list of winners also includes six Global 500 Youth
Environment Award laureates who, despite their young age, have
understood the sanctity of life on Earth. Among these youth winners
are Ecole Propre/Ecole Verte, an environmental education programme
which, in five short years, has taken root in 92 schools throughout
Guinea with more than 20,000 students participating; and Akima
Paul of Grenada for raising environmental awareness on her Caribbean
Island.
"These environmental defenders have demonstrated that it is at
the community and local level where action to protect the environment
acquires its full meaning. In honouring them, UNEP hopes that their
examples will inspire and guide many other men, women and young
people to join the global coalition dedicated to protecting the
environment", said Mr. Toepfer.
Some 664 individuals and organizations, in both adult and
youth categories, have been honoured since UNEP launched the Global
500 award in 1987. Among prominent past winners are: the late French
marine explorer Jacques Cousteau; Ms. Gro Harlem Brundtland, former
Prime Minister of Norway; Ken Saro-Wiwa, the environmental and human
rights activist from Nigeria who was executed for leading the
resistance of the Ogoni People against the pollution of their delta
homeland; the World Wide Fund for Nature; Jimmy Carter, former
President of the United States of America; Jane Goodall of the United
Kingdom whose research on wild chimpanzees and olive baboons provided
insight into the lives of non-human primates; and the late Chico
Mendes, the Brazilian rubber tapper who was murdered during his fight
to save the Amazon forest.
UNEP looks to the world community to identify and nominate
environmental advocates, so that they too can be recognized for their
efforts. Nominations can be obtained from UNEP's Headquarters,
Global 500 Roll of Honour, Information and Public Affairs Branch, P.
O. Box 30552, Nairobi, Kenya, as well as from UNEP's regional
offices.
*******
LIST OF UNITED NATIONS ENVIRONMENT PROGRAMME (UNEP)
1998 GLOBAL 500 LAUREATES
ADULT CATEGORY
Aga Akbar Afghanistan
Mike Anane Ghana
Stephen O. Andersen United States of America
Melih Boydak Turkey
Valery Demianenko Ukraine
Sylvia Earle United States of America
Yasuo Goto Japan
Greening Australia Australia
Jae-Bum Kim Republic of Korea
Feodor Konyukhov Russian Federation
Yuri Mikhailovich Luzhkov Russian Federation
Yongshun Ma People's Republic of China
Anne Mearns Republic of South Africa
Don Merton New Zealand
Zygfryd Nowak Poland
Oeuvre de Bienfaisance pour Haiti Haiti
Yiannakis D. Potamitis Cyprus
YOUTH CATEGORY
P. B. K. L. Agyirey-Kwakye Ghana
Ecole Propre/Ecole Verte Guinea
Hellenic Marine Environment
Protection Association (HELMEPA) Greece
Leave It To Us Junior Board United Kingdom
Akima Paul Grenada
Red Scarf Environmental
Protection Action Group People's Republic of China
/...
-3-
Note to Editors
Aga Akbar is a lanky zookeeper who, during the fighting in
Afghanistan, lived 18 terrible months on the front lines rather than
abandon his charges. Through the worst of the fighting, Akbar
stayed. He spent hours huddled beneath a slab of stone waiting for
the rocketing to stop. He never left because he loved these animals.
The front line is now on the southern outskirts of Kabul, and
the relative peace has been a chance for him to clean-up the zoo.
Hundreds of pieces of unexploded ordinance have been hauled away, a
mountain of shrapnel swept up and a half dozen anti-personnel
mines removed. Still living on the grounds, Akbar devotes his time
to the animals who survived. They are his family. What Akbar lacks
in expertise he makes up in compassion.
Mike Anane, an environmental journalist, has greatly
contributed to raising environmental awareness in Ghana. His
campaigns calling for the closure of an asbestos products factory
shook the country's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the
Ministry of Environment from their slumber. His articles dealing
with toxic waste earned him many enemies who threatened his life.
Undaunted, he went on to challenge the Parliament and the EPA to
investigate the matter. Their inquiry concurred with Anane's
findings and they recommended that the culprits be punished. Anane
established in Accra an International Centre for Environmental
Journalism, which seeks to motivate the media to take a more serious
interest in the environment. As founder of the League of
Environmental Journalists in Ghana, he organizes workshops to equip
journalists to report on the environment, since neither of the
country's two media-training institutions offer courses in
environmental reporting.
Sylvia Earle's PhD dissertation created a sensation in the
oceanographic community in 1966. Never before had a marine scientist
made such a detailed first-hand study of aquatic life. Since then,
she has made a lifelong project of cataloguing every species of plant
that can be found in the Gulf of Mexico. She has led more than 50
expeditions. In 1969, Earle participated in the Tektite project
where scientists lived for weeks in an enclosed habitat on the ocean
floor, and in 1970, she led the all-female Tektite II expedition. In
1979, she walked untethered on the ocean floor at a lower depth
than any human before or since. With the aim of making the public
aware of the damage being done to the aquasphere, Earle has become an
outspoken advocate of undersea research, and has written for
National Geographic and produced numerous books and films.
Yasuo Goto, Chairman of the Yasuda Fire and Marine Insurance
Company, is a business leader who always includes the environment in
his company's policies. Since 1993, more than 3,000 people have
participated in environmental awareness courses, organized by Yasuda
in collaboration with non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Yasuda
has reduced the use of natural resources by implementing an
environmental management system. In November 1997, its computer
centre became the first financial institution in Japan to be
certified in conformity with ISO14001. Today, it is providing other
organizations with the know-how to obtain certification. In 1992, he
led the Japan Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren)
delegation to the Earth Summit in Brazil, where he represented some
1,000 companies. Soon after, the Keidanren Nature Conservation Fund
(KNCF) was established and Goto appointed its Chairman. KNCF has
supported 71 conservation projects, implemented by NGOs, in 23
countries. KNCF also hosts seminars to educate Japanese business
leaders on nature conservation. KNCF has been lauded as a shining
example of partnership between business and NGOs.
Greening Australia is a national, community-based organization
working with Australians to rehabilitate and manage Australia's
vegetation. Activities include the National Tree and the One
Billion Trees Programmes through which more than 800 million trees
have been planted. In 1996 and 1997, Greening Australia protected or
regenerated 8,194 hectares of vegetation and planted 5,000 hectares
of trees and shrubs. During the same period, its staff worked with
3,000 landcare and community groups and more than 500 local
organizations; conducted 300 public presentations; and delivered more
than 8,000 hours of training to landowners, schools, councils and
community groups. Since 1982, Greening Australia has developed and
implemented vegetation programmes for four national governments.
Jae-Bum Kim is one of the most active leaders of the
environmental movement in the Republic of Korea. His activities began
when he used his scuba diving skills to clean rivers and streams and
by convincing fellow divers to become part of the environmental
movement. In 1991, he set up and became Executive Director of the
`Clear Water Revival' organization which initiated an underwater
clean-up campaign. As a professor of journalism, he also realizes
the importance of educating young people about the environment. In
1994, he formed the Green Family Movement through which green
activities are undertaken by schools, from kindergarten to
universities. More than 40,000 students in 316 schools are active
members of this movement.
Feodor Konyukhov is an environmental globetrotter who only
uses environmentally-friendly modes of transport, such as sailboats,
bicycles, skis, sleds and balloons. His aim is to promote the
sustainable use of the Earth's natural resources and the ethics of
living in harmony with nature. Konyukhov will soon be sailing solo
around the globe in a campaign to clean-up the oceans from
plastic garbage. He is one of the few people to have reached both
the North and South Poles, crossed the Arctic Ocean, climbed mount
Everest, sailed twice around the world, and cycled across Asia and
Europe. All of this in an effort to raise environmental awareness
and to bring attention to environmental issues.
Yuri Luzhkov is a leader committed to sustainable urban
development and whose campaign promises have already begun to
materialize. He has removed environmentally-unsafe industries from
the capital and established an environmental procurator's office as
well as a special police department for environmental protection for
the Moscow region. He has contributed to the stabilization of air
pollution from cars by improving fuel quality, equipment of municipal
transport by installing catalytic converters, and the flow of traffic
by altering the City's routes. Luzhkov has placed a full ban on
the use of leaded fuel and has set new standards on the construction
of ring highways which must meet certain environmental requirements.
He also established a new policy whereby the use of coal in thermal
power plants and by large industries has been replaced by natural
gas. As a result, carbon dioxide emissions have been reduced
significantly. He has enforced the law requiring the renewal
of purifying systems in industrial plants and has changed the way in
which galvanic processes are undertaken, and centralized the use of
galvanic waste, thus reducing the level of heavy metals in the
Moscow River.
Yongshun Ma was a lumberman in China. When he retired in
1982, people encouraged him to relax during his last days. His
response was always "I cannot until I have paid off a debt". He felt
that had he not overlogged, if he had paid more attention to
protecting the environment, there would not have been so much
environmental degradation. He decided to devote the last part of his
life to the protection of the environment by planting 36,500 trees to
make up for those he had cut down. Every season, people would see him
planting trees. In 1991, when he reached the age of 78, he counted
that there were around 1,000 trees left to pay off his debt. He
convinced his family, 16 people spanning three generations, to plant
trees on holidays. At the end of that spring, at last his debt
was paid off. By 1996, he had planted 40,000 trees. Motivated by his
actions, more and more people in the region are planting trees and
the forest is growing at an ever increasing rate. He has taught
others how to breed and plant successfully, and under his guidance,
his students' tree planting efforts have a success rate of 95 per
cent. Today, at 84, you can still see Yongshun Ma, spade in hand,
stirring the black soil, planting trees.
-5-
Don Merton, an officer with the New Zealand Department of
Conservation, roams the forests of the world devising plans to
improve the survival of bird species facing extinction. He has
helped rescue more than a dozen birds, including the Mauritian echo
parakeet, the Chatham Islands black robin and the New Zealand
saddleback. In the Seychelles, he devised techniques to save the
magpie-robin. Slow breeders that fed on the ground, the birds had
been decimated by feral cats. By November 1992, despite a successful
programme to eradicate predators, their numbers dwindled to 25.
Conservationists turned to Merton, and after observing the robins, he
discovered that the native vegetation in the birds' habitat had
virtually disappeared and the forest did not provide enough safe
nesting places. He suggested adjustments to supplementary feeding,
to the positioning of nesting boxes and how to exclude other species
from food and nesting sites. Over the years, the species made
a remarkable recovery and today there are some 60 robins in
existence. In Australia, zoologists are using techniques modelled on
Merton's to rescue the helmeted honey eater.
Ecole Propre/Ecole Verte is an environmental education
programme, which was created in 1992, as a pilot project, in four
primary schools in Conakry, Guinea. Today, the project has taken
root in 92 schools with 20,000 students participating. The
objectives are to encourage schools to play an active role in
promoting hygiene and environmental protection; to get students to
spread the environmental message in their schools, families,
neighbourhoods and villages; and to encourage parents and the
community to take action. Through their ecological clubs, the
students ensure that the classrooms, latrines and yard are clean and
that flowerbeds are well managed. They control the sale of food
around the school and educate the community using plays, films,
debates, radio and TV programmes and competitions. They publish a
bulletin whose content is produced entirely by the students and which
is distributed nationally and internationally. Under the banner Ecole
Quartier, the project has expanded to include other districts and
villages.
Fifteen-year-old Akima Paul, concerned with the state of the
environment, began to speak out on the issues. She began by using
newsletters sent out by Friends of the Earth as a way of passing on
the environmental message. She wrote articles about the lack of care
for the beaches of her Caribbean Island, the excessive use of plastic
and the cutting down of trees. She then became a member of Friends of
the Earth and enthusiastically participated in all their activities.
She wrote articles for almost every issue of their newsletter on the
myriad of environmental problems affecting her part of the world.
Her strong point is that she speaks and writes with great conviction
about issues which are close to the hearts of the Caribbean people,
young and old alike. To further heighten the people's awareness, she
shares her views on radio, in inter-secondary school debates, and
through the art form of calypso and poetry.
For further information, please contact:
Mr. Tore J. Brevik Elisabeth Guilbaud-Cox
Director, Coordinator, Special Events
Information and Public Affairs Information and Public Affairs
UNEP, P. O.Box 30552 UNEP, P. O.Box 30552
Nairobi, Kenya Nairobi, Kenya
Tel: (254-2) 62 3292 Tel: (254-2) 62 3401
Fax: (254-2) 62 3927 Fax: (254-2) 62 3692
E-mail: Tore.Brevik@unep.org Elisabeth.Guilbaud-Cox@unep.org
UNEP Web Site: http//www.unep.org
UNEP News Release 1998/32
--------------------------------------------
Robert G. Bisset
Media and Communications Officer
UNEP, P.O. Box 30552, Nairobi, Kenya
Tel. +254-2-623084, Fax. +254-2-623692
Robert.Bisset@unep.org, http://www.unep.orgst.org/renewables/bioenergy-list-archive/
--------------------------------------------
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