Anti-littering campaign making waves

There has been a renewed push toward a cleaner and greener Barbados over the last three months through the Don’t Waste Barbados national anti-littering campaign which has also gained regional attention.

Founder Anthony Da Silva told Barbados TODAY he launched the initiative because he could not sit idly by while indiscriminate dumping continued across the island.

“All Barbadians know that we have a problem where people indiscriminately just dump or dispose of waste in areas where they ought not to, rather than in proper facilities or receptacles. Don’t Waste Barbados is a national campaign sustained over the long term to try to change behaviour,” he explained.

The businessman, who is chairman of the Innotech Group, said the campaign has attracted corporate interest from Prosource and Chefette as well as NGOs like the Future Centre Trust and Eco Rebel.

“We’re trying to work on collaborating with a number of others in this space. This is not something that we feel that we have to take control over but we want to be a part of the solution, and if we can help drive that change that makes Barbados ultimately a better place, then it would be successful,” he said.

Da Silva has also appealed to the public to get involved in the campaign.

“We’ve not just come with an initiative but we actually tried to establish a brand so people can get behind that brand and the initiative that we are serious about making a change. We’ve created a website with greater social media pages, we have an online presence… we have print advertisements, radio advertisements and we’re trying to sensitize Barbadians that it’s not cool to litter,” he said.

His group has already executed a clean-up at Brownes Beach and is now turning attention to littering inland.

Da Silva said the campaign is seeking to recruit 300 young people between the ages of 8 and18 to partner with a company called Ellipsis Earth.

“We’re going to use drone technology and other forms of technology to actually identify waste in public spaces. So these students will actually act as data collectors using the technology to identify where the waste is and actually create a database of that waste and then we can actually make an effort about removing that waste,” he explained.

The Innotech chairman said that even at this early stage the programme has attracted regional attention.

“I’ve just come back from St Kitts. We received an invitation from the solid waste management corporation to [go] to St Kitts because they became aware of the initiative Don’t Waste Barbados….If the opportunity is there for us to establish Don’t Waste St Kitts or Don’t Waste Grenada or Don’t Waste Cayman Island, whatever it takes, if we think we can make a difference and we can be the catalyst for change that leads to cleaner environments, then we certainly want to do that,” DaSilva said.

kobiebroomes@barbadostoday.bb