Saving the Environment Activity 

On a beautiful Sunday afternoon, the women and children program participants of Good Shepherd Centre, Singapore gathered at the Tzu Chi Humanistic Youth Centre to attend an event about saving the environment through recycling and upcycling in line with World Environment Day.

Warm Welcome from the host

Upon arrival, our program participants were greeted by volunteers who welcomed them with open arms. Because they are of different nationalities, they were being divided into 3 language groups – English, Malay and Chinese speaking. Each group then went around with their respective volunteers to participate at their interactive posters to further understand about saving the earth through the 5 Rs of waste management – Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Repurpose and Recycle.  The children were especially excited to be there, as they were curious to learn about the different ways that they could help save the environment.

Waste Management

The next event was a presentation by a guest speaker, Vanessa from Terra.sg, who talked about the importance of waste management. She tested their knowledge on what they had heard based on the talks by the previous presenters.

She gave more examples of how recycling can help save energy, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and conserve natural resources, all of which can help make our planet a better place to live.

Creative Upcycling

During the second part of her talk, she shared another concept called ‘upcycling’ which is the process of reusing old materials to create something more valuable or of a higher quality.  Both our adult and children program participants then participated in an activity that was designed to teach them to transform a cleaned milk box into a multi-purpose holder. The activity was very interactive and engaging that everyone was able to create her own unique multi-holder.

Charity, Education, Medicine, Humanistic Culture & Environment Protection

Next, the organizers brought them on a walkabout within their facility to briefly introduce their vision and mission of their foundation and their 5 pillars of works – Charity, Education, Medicine, Humanistic Culture and especially Environment Protection since that was the focus of our day.

Concluding with a Vegetarian Meal 

In keeping with World  Environment Day we ended the whole celebration with a meal comprising of 5 dishes of vegetarian food.  This was also to teach our program participants that what we eat can also help to lower carbon footprints which is part of saving the earth. The organizers explained that a vegetarian diet can lower carbon footprints.  The food was really delicious and everyone enjoyed it. The young program participants were amazed at how colourful vegetarian food can be and were eager to try and broaden up their taste buds while the adult felt that the dishes changed their idea about vegetarian food.

Understanding the impact on our environment

Overall, the event was a huge success in bringing awareness and understanding of the importance of waste management and how it could have a positive impact on our environment.

Written by:        Brenda Lee

                              Social Service Assistant

                              Good Shepherd Centre

                              Singapore