(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) They were seven kids who loved spending time together, and when one of them had to work on a sustainability project for school, everyone pitched in. Before they knew it, they had already founded the Eco Warriors group.
The group comprises seventh-graders Jayaditya Pratap Singh, Muhammad bin Abdul Razack and Aryan Kundra from GEMS Modern Academy; Adnaan Bookwala from The Millennium School; and Manit Awtani from GEMS Wellington School; along with Anika Singh, a Grade 1 kid at GEMS Modern Academy; and Mahreen, who is in her second kindergarten year.
Their green advocacy started a year ago as a school project, which required students to choose real-world problems linked to the UN sustainable goals and find solutions. As they did their research and brainstormed about what could be done for Mother Earth, they realised how crucial it is to spread awareness and work towards sustainable development in every way possible. Soon enough, they turned their schoolwork initiative into a passion project.
"People need to be educated to opt for sustainable solutions," said Aryan.
Eco Warriors felt strongly about UN Sustainable Development Goal No. 14 'Life Below Water', and so they came up with ideas to fight plastic pollution and reduce the alarming volume of single-use plastic trash that ends up in oceans.
Jayaditya said: "Plastic pollution is seeping into the environment. We formed this group in the summer of 2018 with the primary aim to beat plastic pollution in our own small ways."
The group meets once a month for their core activity: Making newspaper bags and distributing them to grocery stores and cafes across Dubai. They have placed collection boxes in their buildings so that residents may easily drop off their newspapers, which are then turned into bags.
"We feel that there should be a lot of general awareness among the public about the harmful effects of single-use plastic. We came across this problem and had to convince people in supermarkets and small cafes to use paper bags," said Aryan.
Muhammad said: "We need to make some simple changes in our daily lives, such as using fabric bags and metal or bamboo cutlery. Reducing trash in our households is also important."
One of their main objectives is to show how people can reduce their waste as they go about their daily routine. "We tell them that we can all bring trash volumes down if we would reuse things instead of throwing them away," said Adnan.
Some other humanitarian projects undertaken by the young eco-warriors include upcycling blank pages from old notebooks to make new ones.
They have also been creating teaching aids and educational resources using waste materials and these are then distributed to needy schools in rural India.
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