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| Participants (Photo: Mamadou Edrisa Njie) |
He was speaking on Thursday 31 October during the
official launch of $25,000 Biodiversity Action Journalists-Gambia (BAJ-Gambia)
project on “public awareness [creation] on
environmental protection” held at Tango conference hall at
Fajara.
The project is intended to create awareness creation
on environmental protection and conservation techniques, create a platform for
information sharing on matters relating to the environment, and enhance public
awareness on environmental protection and mitigation strategies.
Bojang told the inception forum
which attracted members of BAJ-Gambia, donors, and invited stakeholders that “the
project will contribute towards that realization” and look forward to working
closely with BAJ-Gambia and all its partners for the successful implementation
of the project.
The GEF Small Grants Programme (SGP) embodies the
very essence of sustainable development by “thinking globally and acting
locally”, he noted.
GEF is also mean to provide financial and technical
support to projects that conserve and restore the environment while enhancing
people’s well-being and livelihoods, while the SGP demonstrate that community
action can maintain the fine balance between human needs and environmental
imperatives.
Abdou Rahman
Sallah, BAJ-Gambia national coordinator, said the importance of protecting and
conserving of the country’s remaining biological and natural recourse cannot be
over emphasized.
He said the Gambia’s biodiversity resource is
dwindling unprecedentedly and as citizens “we must act collectively” to protect
the resources for present and future generations.
Lamin Jawara, deputy permanent secretary Ministry of
Environment, Parks and Wildlife, noted that this initiative [the BAJ project]
is in line with “our current national biodiversity action plan and the Banjul
Declaration of 1977.”
“Protected areas are the mainstay of biodiversity
conservation, while also contributing to people’s livelihoods, particularly at
the local level,” he said.
Jawara said protected areas are at the core of
efforts towards conserving nature and the services they provide including food,
clean water supply, medicines and protection from the impacts of natural
disasters.
BAJ-Gambia is an environmental and natural resources
youth-led organization founded in December 2010 with technical support from
department of parks and wildlife management.
The formation of BAJ-Gambia came out from a study
tour to Senegal in early 2010, through Niumi-Saloum transboundary Biosphere
project that was jointly implemented by Senegal and The Gambia.
Its membership is made up of environmental and
natural resource-focused journalists from print and electronic (including
social media), and youth activists.
Written by Amadou
Bah of The Voice newspaper
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