GES, ZOOMLION LAUNCH KIDS CLUB (PAGE 42, JUNE 24, 2010)

THE Upper West Regional Directorate of the Ghana Education Service (GES) has, in collaboration with Zoomlion Ghana, a private waste management company, launched a Zoom Kids Club to conscientise children to the need to embrace personal hygiene and environmental cleanliness.
It is also aimed at encouraging children to be conscious about the effects of their actions and inactions on the environment.
The club, which has over 2000 member from schools across the region, is expected to complement the efforts of Zoomlion Ghana to champion the crusade on cleanliness.
The Regional Director of Education, Mr Febian Bellieb, who launched the initiative, said he would personally ensure that teachers and patrons of the Zoom Kids Clubs sensitised the public to cleanliness and good sanitation practices in the region.
In a speech read on his behalf by Mrs Beatrice Amponsah, the National Co-ordinator of the Environmental Sanitation Unit of Zoomlion, the Chief Executive Officer of Zoomlion Ghana Ltd, Mr Joseph Siaw Agyapong, said while continuing with the education of the adult populace and the management of waste among other interventions, Zoomlion Ghana was targeting children in the schools to let them appreciate the need for good sanitation practices.
He said the initiative was part of the social responsibilities of the company to encourage cleanliness within the various vicinities which in the long run would make the entire nation clean.
On the role the children would be playing as members of Zoom Kids Clubs, the Zoomlion CEO explained that the children would not be taught anything complex but simple practices which would be easy for them to adapt, saying, “If children were conscious of environmental sanitation, adults would be left with no option but to adopt the best of habits as far as cleanliness and the management of waste within communities and homes were concerned”.
Mr Agyapong further mentioned that members of the clubs would frequently be engaged in tree planting, drama and quizzes, as well as excursions to waste management organisations, for them to come to terms with issues bordering on waste management and the need for cleanliness.
For his part, the Regional Operations Supervisor of Zoomlion, Mr Emmanuel Volsuuri, said the formation of Zoom Kids Clubs in schools was to change the attitudes of the new generation towards environmental cleanliness.
He called for the continued propagation of messages on environmental cleanliness and said, “We must preach these subjects on any platform, be it the church, community durbars and at the mosques”.
Mr Volsuuri also called for a total change of attitude by the citizenry towards issues regar the environment.
He gave an assurance that the management of Zoomlion would continue to collaborate with all stakeholders including the various local government institutions, the media and the GES to monitor and ensure that the clubs remained vibrant and were used for the purposes for which they were formed.