Over 2000 students from various government schools across the city took part in a colourful environment procession, led by personnel from the Mounted Police, before joining in picking up litter from an area close to Mushrif Park on the Academic City Road heralding the start of a 4-day voluntary clean-up drive organised by Dubai Municipality.

Abdullah Raffia, Assistant Director General of the Municipality for Environment and Public Health Affairs, formally opened the Clean Up the World 2007 campaign on Tuesday in a ceremony attended by several government officials, representatives of private companies sponsoring the campaign, students and a large number of volunteers.

The opening event also included an environment-themed parade by school students and a competition involving sculptures made of recyclable materials. In another area close to the ceremony’s venue, staff from "Carrefour" took part in a simultaneous clean-up drive.

Nearly 17,000 volunteers will take part in the country’s largest voluntary clean up drive, which will also include several awareness initiatives aimed at reducing waste and encouraging the public to reuse or recycle. The campaign, which is observed this year under the banner: “Our Climate, Our Actions, Our future”, will last until 23 November.

“Dubai Municipality is committed to improve public cleanliness in the emirate in cooperation with individuals, government establishments, private firms and non-governmental organisations through effective participation,” said Mr. Raffia.

He noted that it is the 14th consecutive year that Dubai is organising the campaign which has such noble objectives as forging a sense of mutual cooperation among organisations and institutions concerned with environment in planning and executing environment action programmes, enhancing environment awareness of the community on waste reduction and recycling issues, ensuring participation of institutions and individuals in environment programmes, cleaning up the local environment, and encouraging team-work in finding lasting solutions for the growing waste problem.

“The campaign also seeks to encourage media to focus on environment protection activities thereby enhancing awareness of governments and industries with regard to local environment issues such as waste reduction, recycling and safe disposal of waste,” he said.

Hassan Makki, Assistant Director of Environment Department and Head of the campaign organising team, said apart from Dubai Municipality, several government departments, NGOs, and voluntary organisations are participating in this year’s campaign.

The second day’s (Wednesday, 21 Nov) activities include marine clean up by divers, sailors and fishermen on the Deira creek side (adjacent to twin towers), clean up the world leaflet launch and distribution, information literature and distribution of awareness leaflets to public. In a bid to educate the young generation on the need to preserve environment, 1000 specially-designed litterbins will be delivered on Wednesday (21 November) to 65 schools in Dubai. “This initiative is aimed teaching the students their small action by safely disposing the litter can make a big difference for the environment we live in,” said Mr. Makki.

On the third day (Thursday, 22 November), nearly 3000 volunteers from private schools, colleges, and universities will collect debris from the former vegetable market area at Hamriya along Deira Corniche. Also on this day, pest control companies in Dubai will participate in the campaign by undertaking pest control activities in various areas.

The last day of the campaign (Friday, 23 Nov) will see thousands of volunteers from the general public including private company staff, non-governmental organisations, community groups and private entities joining hands in cleaning up Wadi Al Amardi along Academic City Road and various other sites designated in Al Qouz, Al Khawaneej, Al Qusais, Al Jaddaf, Jumeirah, Umm Suqeim, Hatta, and Jebel Ali. Also on that evening (Friday, 23 November), an environmental photography competition will be organised by the Lightform Filipino Photographers’ Guild at Al Bustan Rotana Hotel and the entries will be displayed prior to the selection and felicitation of the winners on the same day.

The awareness programmes, organised on the sidelines of the campaign, include workshops for general public on recycling and reducing waste, environmental workshops on making usable materials from waste, broadcasting campaign programmes on school radios, collection of used materials in cooperation with Bait Al Khair charitable society, lectures in schools on the importance of waste reduction, and arranging visits for students to waste recycling factories. The Environment and Health Awareness Office will organise special awareness programmes for Dubai Municipality staff including an email contest.

Some 20,000 high-quality T-shirts and more than 10,000 caps, printed with the campaign’s logo, will be distributed among the volunteers.

The campaign is supported by Gulf Eternit Industries, Tetra Pak, Tadweer, Al Bustan Rotana, Al Naboodah Group and Zenath Recycling and Waste Management LLC.