Keekli Reporter, 20th-26th March, 2018, Shimla
As learning becomes fun so does the interest to whole-heartedly participate in nature related fun-filled activities. The students of Deodar Eco Club of GSSS Phagli School, Shimla organized week-long events to teach as well as learn about important days and how these are affecting our lives — World Water Day, World Sparrow Day, World Wildlife Day and Earth Hour Day. School Principal Rama Reitka along with Teacher in-charge Sarika Ahuja, emphasized on the importance of these days and what future bearing they would have in our lives. She further elaborated about the concept of Global Warming and how switching off the lights for an hour would make a lot of difference in this World.
The students took a pledge to save earth by giving up deodorants and plastic bottles as these are not bio-friendly and take years to decompose. During this period a poster, slogan making and writing competition was held on the theme “Nature for Water”.
The students also celebrated big cats by making masks, watching a documentary and clips on big cats on World Wildlife Day; while on World Sparrow Day – 20th March – the students looked for their nests and recording the count of sparrows.
The Eco Club also presented an activity calendar on National Science Day on 24th Feb, which was released by Kunal Satyarthi, Member Secretary HIMCOSTE and Manisha Nanda.
The students took it upon themselves to visit the surrounding areas on a cleanliness drive as well as to apprise the citizens of the city to take up more Earth friendly activities to save it from further pollution and degradation.
Few alarming facts that were shared with the students were:
- 71% of natural wetlands have been lost since 1900;
- 2.1 billion people don’ have safe access to drinking water;
- 844 million don’t have basic drinking water service;
- 263 million travel over 30 minutes per trip to collect water;
- 159 million drink untreated water;
- Oceans hold 97% of Earth’s water (saline); while only 3% of our water is non-saline that is available;
- 69% of that is frozen in ice and glaciers; and 30% is in ground;
- Only 26% of world’s water is in fresh water lakes; while 0.01 % is in the atmosphere;
- By 2050, population will grow by 2 billion to nearly 10 billion;
- Increase in water demand will be by 3%.
