DILI, 29 january 2022 (TATOLI)– Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports (MoEYS) and Mercy Corps agree to strengthen environmental resilience in schools across the county.
The objective of this cooperation is to ensure the school environment is healthy and free of diseases. After the country was hit by natural disasters for the last 4 april floods.
General Director of Education, Luis Manuel Fernandes appreciates Mercy Corps’ good intentions to help the Government in managing waste, especially by implementing it in schools in TL.
It is helping all students study in a clean school so they can access a good education.
“This is a joint commitment from two parties. MoEYS is teaching children at school to handle plastic waste through extracurricular activities not only in the Dili municipality and also across the country,” Director Luis in said on his remark at the collaboration signing event in Hotel Timor, friday.
Mercy Corps Director at TL, Jules Keane added: “Children and youth are a key population segment for increasing civil society’s awareness of the environment, mismanagement of plastics. It is contributing to disaster risk caused by climate change.
According to him, school is an important platform to change human behavior. As it empowers students to become agents of change in their household and even create lifelong environment advocates.
“It is also referring to the integration which targets educational activities. This collaboration will be dedicated to helping students. Thus, skills strategies develop are contributing and protecting natural looks and beauty in TL. It is to ensure people are living healthily and safely,” Jules said.
Mr. Jules added the preparedness against the risks of urban flooding and climate change must be prioritized.
Mercy Corps gained some environment project from different program from “PREPERNESS Program”, which financed by Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA).
Therefore the European Union provided financial support to the “Plastic Rubbish Program” and for the Plastics up-cycling Alliance, financed by the United States International Development program (USAID).
He said, those programs are working closely with partners as the key factor to ensure the program is working effectively and efficiently.
It is known that there are some international partners such as USAID, KOICA, EU, local construction company Caltech and global brewer Heineken, Mercy Corps is a member of the Plastics Solutions Alliance, an innovative partnership aimed at advancing TL towards ‘plastic neutral status’.
Where unnecessary plastic use is reduced, restricted, plastic waste is disposed of responsibly, and recyclable materials are recycled into locally sought-after products.
Mercy Corps will work in schools to increase understanding of disaster risk and safe behavior to increase community resilience and reduce the impact of disasters.
Journalist: José Belarmino De Sá
Editor: Rafy Belo
