At the heart of Jumeriah College is a team of individuals who are passionate about composting: Mia, Maria, Piyah, Danyaal together we compost for good.
" We believe that community composting is an important part of building a more resilient world."
Now that we're well into April, Earth Day is right around the corner! Even though here at Jumeirah College we celebrate Earth Day every Day by working towards sustainability as our core mission, we won't pass up an opportunity to talk about why the environment is worth protecting and how composting can be an effective stepping stone in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving soil quality among other benefits. This year we want to share with you our newly launched pilot project 'Zero Waste campaign'.
If global food waste were a country, it would be the third largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Currently community-level composting options in the UAE are limited, thus our project is aiming to change that.
We have reached a new milestone for the Community-based first of its kind Composting program at Jumeriah College.The Project was funded by the members of the team, with the support of the school teachers and staff. We have provided the school with the first step to have a 'close-loop' system, where the creation of compost will go directly towards growing our own crops. This is a victory for all who care about the environment, healthy food and sustainable communities.
RATIONALE
With unprecedented increases in urban population in the UAE, there is increasing concern that large amounts of urban organic waste are generated every day and dumped in landfill sites causing environmental, social, economic and health problems.
Additionally they are becoming potent pollutants adversely affecting sustainability of our beautiful city Dubai and many others. To this end, we have witnessed few years ago in China and elsewhere in the world that people were starved of clean oxygen. This teaches us that we value little for something like clean air which we get easily and free. Thus, it is crucial that sources of pollutants such as urban organic solid waste are properly managed and disposed of. At this juncture, it is worth to note that this waste is the cause of diverse types of problems, and the simple solution would be to convert it into useful materials like compost. As part of our project we decided to look at poverty reduction in terms of a social strategy. A higher rate of recoverability will allow a lowering in the amount of food wasted, and less surplus is left.
Our team 'Zero waste' organized and engaged members of our school community in running a pilot composting project which we hope to upscale and grow into our neighboring communities and schools.
MAIN GOALS:
* To empower, engage and educate all members of our community about the benefits of our project
* To design a self-sustaining and lasting solution to urban solid waste disposal
* To contribute to pollution and lasting solution to urban solid waste disposal
* To contribute to pollution and emission reduction efforts in our city
* To ensure bidirectional flow of nutrients back to the soil
* To serve an effective model to be adopted for all school waste management protocols
OUTCOME:
The impact of the project on a larger scale would be contributing to the literature of adopting soil conservation for preventing soil depletion of nutrients contributing to poverty. When composting forms part of a waste reduction program students learn to become wiser consumers which can lead to us adopting a more responsible and environmentally friendly approach to the use of natural resources, food production, waste reduction and recycling. The ultimate goal is to all collaborate together to help achieve the goal of Zero Hunger by 2030, to protect our planet from degradation through sustainable management. Prosperity is achieved when social and technological progress occurs in harmony with nature.
The propelling force of our project is creativity, drive and ingenuity which keep us going against all obstacles. Even beyond the Jumeirah College bubble, we look forward to seeing many more compost haulers work resiliently under the motto 'Zero Hunger' to continuously reduce food waste, improve soil quality and most importantly keep our communities safe for the future generation.
We can begin to achieve global cooling, first by thanking the Earth and growing our own plants and trees. Are we regenerating the earth or are we degenerating it? The simple solution is to collectively recycle our food waste and turn them to compost. The way forward is for us to model nature, and reduce landfills.