As the residents of the environment around us, it is our foremost responsibility to contribute to the environment’s growth. Also, as the primary consumer of the goods from the environment, it is our foremost responsibility to cooperate in its flourishment. But, to do this, we must first understand the environment. In layman’s terms, ‘environmental awareness’ means understanding the environment.
Environmental Awareness: Understanding it in detail
To gain complete awareness about the environment, these are some pointers that we should keep in mind:
- What are the issues and major problems that are harming the environment?
- What is the nature of the problem?
- Categorizing the issues under critical, mild, continuous, and several other tags. As a result of this, we will understand the issue and find a proper resolution for it.
- The impact of any issue on the environment
- What is the situation of public awareness about the environment? Also, how is sustainability awareness going?
- But, to understand how people are affecting the environment, we have to understand whether they have an awareness of environmental issues.
- What are the necessary measures that we can take in order to get rid of the commonly existing issues around us?
Who Needs to Focus on Gaining Awareness of the Environment?
All of us should take the responsibility to gain awareness about the environment. Based on the type of awareness program one has selected, one should focus on selecting the target audience. As a result, we can ensure the success of our awareness programs.
Moreover, it is very important to spread certain messages among the target audience. If not selected properly, the awareness program will not yield the results in the manner in which we want it to. Hence, it will become difficult for us to see the impact we want.
For example, any program related to not using harmful chemicals should be directed to people working in any industry that deals with those chemicals. Similarly, any program related to using non-renewable sources of energy should direct to people who are using such forms of energy as fuel or in some other manner.
Environmental awareness: Why is it important?
Environmental awareness is important due to the following reasons:
1.) To be able to solve the critical issues.
2.) To handle any major environmental crisis before it arises.
3.) To understand the impact of our daily activities on the organisms around us.
4.) To protect extinct resources from depleting.
5.) To convey what kind of losses we can face if any crisis is not checked beforehand.
Some critical environmental issues
After getting an idea of why environmental awareness is required, we should not focus on the commonly occurring issues. These are issues that are in need of immediate attention.
Below is a list of environmental crises which demand immediate action:
1.) Oil Spills
2.) Harmful plastic waste
3.) Deforestation
4.) Depletion of some precious flora and fauna
5.) Global Warming
6.) Overpopulation
7.) Ocean acidification
8.) Ozone layer depletion
Some popular environmental awareness programs from the past
A lot of environmental awareness programs exist under different campaigns. Many of them are quite successful. We will recall some of them to take an example of how to do it?
1.) Bishnoi Movement: The rush to protect the environment dates back to old historical times. Amrita Devi, a woman from the Marwar region in Rajasthan, had protested against the king’s soldier who was going to cut the trees.
2.) Cipko movement: This is another very popular program that had people hugging the trees in order to prevent cutting down of these.
3.) Narmada Bachao Andolan: Preventing the building of dams on the Narmada river was the prime reason to begin this movement. It was to make people aware of what could be the outcomes of these.
4.) Swachhta Rally: This is another awareness initiative that is being implemented in many schools of Ahmedabad for establishing a green and clean ambiance.
5.) Namami Gange Programme: This program focuses on eradicating pollution and the conservation of the river Ganga. Moreover, this program has a lot of focus points including sewage treatment, monitoring of industrial effluent, public awareness of the riverfront conditions, biodiversity.
6.) Nagar Van Scheme: This is an environmental scheme launched in 2020 with the aim of establishing around 200 forests across the country in the next five years. And it will be effective in avoiding deforestation and soil erosion.
Promoting environmental awareness at an early stage
Promoting environmental awareness in schools and colleges has its own benefits. This will help people in embedding these ideas in their minds since childhood.
Some activities that can help to spread awareness at an early stage are:
1.) Organising painting competitions on environmental themes. While trying to paint the reality, students will understand how disheartening the situation of the environmental resources is.
2.) Celebrating environment days with activities that talk about environmental concerns.
3.) Including grades for some activity related to environmental well-being. For instance, school children can be taken on a river wastage cleaning spree. Or, they could be taken to rallies where they can plant trees.
4.) Organizing exhibitions, art events, open mics, and similar other events for promoting the required awareness.
Environmental awareness month: major pointers
November is environmental awareness month. The promotion of environmental awareness among the public can be achieved through some of these activities:
1.) Some sort of campaigns can be set up with an itinerary for the entire month of November. It can have awareness programs along with fun activities that will encourage people to join in more.
2.) The awareness program can include walking tours such as plastic cleaning walking tours. In such tours, people can start with clearing out all the plastic waste in an area and by evening they can set up tents. Here, they can perform poetry on environmental issues in the bonfire set up.
3.) Crowdfunding can be done to raise money to hire the necessary resources. These resources will be for different activities that come under such public awareness of environmental programs.
Public awareness of environment: How?
After getting a good understanding of why environmental awareness is required, we can now focus on how to do it? What should be our approach to put across an effective awareness program?
At a high level
1.) A major step here can be to get more and more people involved. We can start with getting our family, colleagues, and friends to participate in these programs.
2.) Also, we should get local influencers and leaders to participate because of the kind of impact that they are likely to create. People will listen to them and organizing activities get a lot easier once a politician is involved. One can get permission easily.
3.) Environmental awareness is something that we can start at a very small level also. Discussing this subject with school children right from the start can yield many benefits. If habits such as saving resources and energies are built up in children, it gets easier for children to grow up with the same habits rather than learning after they have already spent a major part of their lives.
4.) The activities that we can include in an awareness program can be rallies, street plays, theaters, short skits, creativity competitions.
5.) Street plays are one of the most effective ways of conveying things. Apart from being very effective, street plays help you to put across a point in a very creative manner. And it will ultimately settle it in the mind of the viewers because it’s easy to remember what you are explaining through formations and acts.
At a low level: Everyday habits
1.) Painting competitions should come upon environmental issues to make people understand the importance of preserving resources. It can also teach them to avoid small harmful day-to-day activities.
2.) We can invest in buying products that are reusable rather than non-recyclable plastic or any other product. We should also avoid buying disposable goods.
3.) Another thing that we can do is trying to use clean sources of energy such as solar energy or wind energy.
4.) We should use organic food packages rather than food that uses pesticides and other harmful preservatives.
5.) Cutting down on transportation fuel by opting for a carpool is another effective way to protect the environment. It can save the environment from the harmful effects of pollution and other sorts of degradation.
Frequently Asked Questions(FAQs) on eco-awareness
Let us go through some questions that people frequently ask in this context to clear any doubts that we might have.
1.) What are some examples of invisible pollutants harming the environment?
Invisible air pollutants include colorless and odorless substances. These are mostly present in the air and are toxic to the environment. For instance, Carbon Monoxide is a major invisible pollutant.
2.) How is air quality measured?
AQI (Air Quality Index) is the measure of the quality of air. This tells you how polluted the air is. It works like a thermometer that runs from 0 to 500 degrees. However, unlike a thermometer, AQI measures the amount of air pollution.
3.) How would one remove pollutants from the atmosphere?
Surely, there are several methods of doing so. One such way of removing environmental pollution is precipitation. As a result of this, particles settle down and it is easy to segregate them.
The takeaways on environmental awareness
Until now, we have analyzed the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ in the context of environmental awareness. And we reach the conclusion that we need to create some effective programs. Besides, we need to set up the desired target audience and convey our ideas through various activities.
Moreover, we understood that starting these activities and promoting awareness among people at a very early age is important. It can boost the efficiency in bringing up some great future caretakers for the environment.
