Earth Day 2017

On April 19 2017, KAFRED organises Earth Day 2017 in cooperation with UNITE, Miss Earth and Uganda Wildlife Authority. With this event, the organisation aimed at making people think about their consumer behaviour and their impact on the earth. Because waste management is a major challenge in the whole of Uganda, the slogan “Proper waste management, everyone’s responsibility” was used to emphasise this issue.

With over 5.000 people in attendance the celebration was a great success-bringing environmental conservation to the forefront of the day. Bigodi Secondary School had been transformed in a big venue for the event with several tents, numerous of stalls and activities. The celebration included performances by local schools and community groups, cooking, movie showings, a raffle game and an exciting matooke peeling contest.

The event started with a football and volleyball match, followed by a massive clean-up action that started at the Bigodi trading center and ended at Bigodi Secondary School. After numerous of poems, songs and  dances, the guest of honour arrived at the venue. His majesty King of Tooro Dr. Oyo Nyimba Kabamba Iguru Rukidi IV, who is very involved in environment actions, wanted to make the people aware of the current situation and possible consequences of bad waste management. The king gave a long and interesting speech and visited every stall to see what schools and organisations were doing to support the environment.

World Environment Day 2017

Every year on June 5, World Environmental Day occurs as the United Nation’s principle vehicle for encouraging worldwide awareness and action for the protection of our environment. Annually 143 countries participate, and so does Uganda. In 2017 World Environment Day took place in Ibanda, a town in southwestern Uganda. A huge field had been transformed into the venue of this important venue. Numerous of organisations that strive for awareness for the environment were invited to exhibit in tents to share their ideas and influence other people to do the same. The large amount of visitors was also being entertained by performances of local schools and community groups.

The climax of the event was the arrival of the president of the Republic of Uganda, Yoweri Museveni. The president is very active in environment actions and together with other and came to share his ideas with the attendants and the world. In order to give a good example of supporting the environment, a tree was planted by him. KAFRED was invited by the Kamwenge district to exhibit in the wetland section of the venue.

KAFRED and UNITE, represented by 5 people, were able to inspire a large amount of people with their actions to protect the environment, more specifically the wetlands. The wetlands of Uganda have a very rich biodiversity and people have to become aware of the need to protect them. For their own sake, for the sake of the future generations and for the sake of the world.