On a recent Sunday, volunteers thronged the beaches and lakes in and around Chennai for a clean-up event hosted by the Environmentalist Foundation of India on Sunday.
As many as 400 volunteers took part in the event.
The initiative — ‘For a Starter, Volunteer For Water’ — is aimed at cleaning up waterbodies to ensure a garbage-free, clean environment for humans and other life forms. The focus is on clearing non-biodegradable trash like rubber, thermocol, polythene and medical waste.
“We organise cleanups every week at all the major beaches and lakes in Chennai. We also have extended this initiative to Coimbatore, Pondicherry and Rameshwaram in Tamil Nadu; as well to 7 other states across the country,” says K. Pavithran, Conservation Coordinator at EFI.
“We have been getting a good response from people and the number of volunteers is increasing with every clean-up event, thanks to social media. It is through various social media platforms that we have garnered considerable support for our initiatives. Our recent clean-up events saw as many as 400 volunteers each at Besant Nagar and Pattinampakkam beaches,” he says. The organisation aims to involve the community in order to work for conservation so that they will have maximum participants and also in order to make the project sustainable and long-lasting. Their ultimate aim is to ensure cleaner habitats for all dependent life forms.
“We also stress upon the fact that people have to change their lifestyles to make any change happen. They have to avoid using ‘use and throw’ products to reduce the amount of garbage accumulating at these places,” he says.
EFI also organises street plays, wall-painting activities, lake safaris and plantation tours to create awareness about this issue.