Earth Day Network Blog Updates

The island of Taiwan boasts 23 million residents, and thanks to the Taiwan Environmental Information Association (TEIA), a tree has been planted for one out of every ten of them.

The world is ramping up for Earth Day next week, and the Arab Gulf region is no exception!  In United Arab Emirates, Earth Day Network’s partner Emirates Environmental Group (EEG) has already held two events in Dubai as part of EDN’s A Billion Acts of Green®, the world’s largest environmental service campaign.

Since the United Nations dubbed 2011 the ‘Year of the Forest,’ many environmental groups across the globe are orchestrating mass tree plantings in order to reverse deforestation and offset carbon emissions. Since 2005, La Reserva Forest Foundation (LRFF) has been working locally to promote tropical forest growth in Costa Rica, and has decided to use Earth Day 2011 to ‘branch out’ and share their message with communities all over the world. 

Earth Day is celebrated every year in a variety of ways, through tree plantings, beach cleanups, community recycling drives, and many more eco-inspired gatherings. However, Splurge Art Gallery in Bucerias, Mexico has decided to take a different approach to their Earth Day celebration.

Earth Day India Director Karuna Singh reported today that her phenomenal organizing team has scheduled 100 events all over the country.

Working with regional governments, educational institutions and internationally renowned non-profit organizations such as Ela Bhatt's Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA), Earth Day India will be educating students, teachers, and government officials about all aspects of the environment. "It almost feels like Earth Day 1970 in the US is being replicated in 2011 in India!" Karuna said.

Despite late March’s wet chill Wednesday morning, the D.C. Embassy Greening Forum convened a rousing group of many embassy representatives, D.C. government, local green facilities specialists, the U.S. State Department and Earth Day Network.

Today, only 16% of rural Haitians have access to adequate sanitation facilities. The cities aren't much better, with half of Haiti's urban population left without a working sewer system. Waste is often dumped by residents in local waterways and abandoned buildings. When collected, trucks carrying loads of waste usually offload into Haiti’s sole dump in Port-au-Prince or rivers throughout the country. With a population of about 9.7 million, waste removal in Haiti has become a sanitation and, thus, environmental crisis.

Earth Day Network is proud to announce a new partnership for Earth Day 2011 with the Environment Action Association (EAA), a South Korean non-profit organization dedicated to combating climate change in Asia and the United States. To commemorate this year’s Earth Day, EAA has expanded its 10th Annual International Art Contest for a Green Environment­­­­­ to include students in both South Korea and the United States.

As contributions continue to pour into Earth Day Network’s Billion Acts of Green® campaign, we are constantly impressed with the actions from partners around the globe who are committing monumental acts of sustainability for their communities and the world. Inspired by the vision and goals of Earth Day, Green Ghana Volunteers, a community-based volunteer partnership program based in Accra, Ghana, is promoting environmental sustainability in a big way!

As we approach Earth Day, schools all over the world are preparing events and activities for this international day to honor our planet, and the Middle East is no exception, despite widespread unrest in the region.  In Amman, Jordan, students at Patriarch Diodoros, “The 1st School” formed an ‘Earth Day Volunteers’ group and are ‘greening’ their school inside and out.  So far, they have improved their school garden and held school-wide assemblies on the environment.