Chandigarh, July 29: Today, in continuation of its consistent campaign for eradication of single use plastic from the city, Department of Environment, Yuvsatta-NGO and Eco Club of Dev Samaj College of Education organized an Eco Club Teachers Training programme on theme of ‘Single Use Plastic Free India’, at college’s main auditorium. Sh. Debendra Dalai, IFS, CCF cum Director, Department of Environment, Chandigarh Administration was the Chief guest on the occasion. And Principals and teachers from over 107 schools and colleges of the city participated.

On the occasion Sh. Debendra Dalai shared that from past World Earth Day on April 22 to World Environment Day, June 5^th, their Department and Yuvsatta-NGO launched a 45 days STOP-Students Take on Plastics campaign in city schools and based on the activities conducted during the period, today five best schools were honoured with ‘Plastic Pollution Free School Awards’. And the five winners were St. Joseph’s Sr. Sec. School, Ankur School, Govt. Model Sr. Sec. School, Sector 16D, Gurukul Global School and DAV Model School, Chandigarh.

Mr. Dalai further added that today’s Earth Overshoot Day signifies that due to excessive consumerism, we the human beings use 73 percent more natural resources than the Earth can produce in a year. We’ve only been mass-manufacturing plastic for 60 years, but in that time have produced an impressive 8.3 billion tonnes – the equivalent weight of a billion elephants! Less impressive is that only 9% of this has been recycled. Instead, waste plastic is left to pollute our land, seas and air. Every minute, the equivalent of one garbage truck of plastic is dumped into our oceans, in landfills or burnt in incinerators, releasing harmful emissions. And if no action is taken by 2050, there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans. So it's imperative for each one of us to behave responsibly and be the change beginning with taking a pledge that come what may, we’ll not use single use plastic items in our daily life. Students and teachers have to become eco-warriors to save mother earth from this scourge of plastic pollution.

Prominent amongst those who addressed the gathering included Mr. Pramod Sharma, Coordinator of Yuvsatta, Mr. Shanky Jain, team lead of SBM PMU at MC, Chandigarh, Mrs. Monica Chawla, Principal, St. Joseph’s Sr. Sec. School, Dr. Parminder Duggal, Principal of Ankur School & Dr. Brij Bhushan Sharma, Scientist, Department of Environment, Chandigarh Administration.