Rwanda to host World Environment Day celebrations

Rwanda to host World Environment Day celebrations

World Environment Day (WED) falls each year on 5 June. It is a day when people focus on the environment and it is celebrated in over 100 countries. World Environment Day was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1972 to mark the opening of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment.

The World Environment Day is created to promote environmental issues to become active agents of sustainable and equitable development. It promotes an understanding that communities are pivotal to changing attitudes towards environmental issues and advocates partnership that will ensure all nations and peoples enjoy a safer and more prosperous future. World Environment Day embodies this approach, raising awareness, encouraging people to voice their thoughts and do their utmost to improve the environment.

However, the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) selected the Rwandan capital of Kigali as the epicenter for this year’s festivities because of its environmental richness, including rare and economically important species such as the mountain gorillas (for more about mountain gorillas), as well as its pioneering transition to a ‘green’ economy. The theme of this year’s Day will be “Many Species. One Planet. One Future.”

“Rwanda is an African nation that, despite big challenges, is seizing the multiple opportunities possible from green economic policies,” said UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner.

Additionally, on February 18, 2010 Rwanda was chosen to play global host to celebrations for the 2010 World Environment Day which is observed annually on 5 June, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) announced. The announcement was made based on Rwanda’s combination of environmental richness, including rare and economically important species such as the mountain gorillas, allied to newly evolving and pioneering green policies is among the reasons why UNEP welcomed its offer to be the global 2010 host. For your Rwanda safari

Following the East African country, known as the “land of a thousand hills,” is turning to some innovative environmental strategies, such as a ban on plastic bags, ecological clean up campaigns, a conservation corridor for chimpanzees, and the development of renewable energies such as solar power and biogas generation, noted UNEP.

More so, “the pairing of Rwanda with World Environment Day in 2010 is thus a compelling and inspiring alliance, underlining that all economies, rich and poor and North and South, have real and tangible opportunities to shape a more sustainable development path,” stressed Mr. Steiner.

The director of  United Nation Environment programme added on and said this year’s celebrations are slated to be bigger than ever before, building on the unprecedented success of 2009 when people in more than 80 countries registered activities on the World Environment Day website and more than 10,000 people joined the “twitter for trees” campaign.

Since the World Environment Day can be celebrated in many ways, including street rallies, bicycles parades, green concerts, essay and poster competitions in schools, tree planting, recycling efforts, clean-up campaigns and much more. In many countries, this annual event is used to enhance political, social economic and environmental attention and action of the people.

In a related development, UNEP announced a series of green measures for October’s Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India, from boosting energy efficiency and air quality to expanding the city’s forests. ‘The Commonwealth Games, like the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup, represent an inordinate opportunity to pilot innovative ideas and transformational policies able to deliver a low-carbon, resource efficient green economy,” said Mr. Steiner.

“The potential positive impact for Delhi’s 14 million inhabitants is matched by the environmental awareness generated across the world,” he added. “UNEP is delighted to be working with the Commonwealth Games for the first time ever and look forward to a positive environmental legacy for the residents of this historic capital city.”

Therefore, this celebration will be too advantageous to the Tourism sector of the East African Region, and due to such celebrations one shouldn’t miss in life to visit Rwanda and be close to the natural beauty of the Land of Thousand Hills.

For more information on Rwanda gorilla trekking, such as 3 days gorilla safari or Rwanda cultural safaris visit the Rwanda mountain gorillas website.