Rema banks on youth for environmental protection

INVESTING in the young generation as agents of change is the easiest way to build a culture of environment protection, the Deputy Director-General of Rwanda Environment Management Authority (Rema), Eng. Colletha Ruhamya, has said.Eng. Ruhamya made the call during the launch of a greening programme at Groupe Scolaire Musave in Gasabo District last week.“There is need to invest in the young generation as agents of change so that they lead the struggle of protecting our environment. This is the easiest way to change the mindset and build a culture of people taking personal responsibility of protecting our environment,” Eng. Ruhamya said.The greening programme is currently ongoing in at least 157 schools countrywide, while Rema targets to add more 36 schools on the programme this year.Eng. Ruhamya said the programme is being implemented through the school environment clubs as a tool to mainstream the environment protection agenda in these schools.Officials say the programme addresses issues of health as well as preserving the environment in the selected schools like keeping the schools clean and green.National environmental protectionIt is being implemented in partnership with the Ministry of Education, Unicef, World Wide Fund for Nature, Lake Victoria Catchment Environmental Education Programme and district authorities, among other partners.Rema has so far trained 32 participants from each school, including teachers and students, on how best the programme can be implemented. For successful implementation, a monitoring mechanism has been put in place that engages teachers, parents and local leaders.Meanwhile, the Minister for Natural Resources, Stanislas Kamanzi urged schools to embrace the programme, saying it greatly contributes to the national environment protection programme.“Environment protection should be considered a national issue and everyone should willingly play a part; I commend this initiative for its contribution toward our target as a nation,” he said.The government targets to have at least 30 per cent forest cover of the entire country by 2020; and this has seen various tree planting campaigns initiated to contribute toward achieving this target.