At UkrHydrometCenter MAMA-86 Shares Ideas of Sustainable Food with Students of Kyiv Minor Academy of Sciences Print
Wednesday, 02 October 2013 00:00

131002 hydrometcenter_minor_academy_sciences_sustainable_food_meetingOctober 2, 2013, Kyiv — MAMA-86 in conjunction with the Ukrainian Hydrometeorological Center and the Kyiv Minor Academy of Sciences organized a meeting/lecture with the academy’s students. Representatives from the NGO told about environmental problems related to food production and consumption.

Students and instructors from the academy’s scientific departments “Ecology & Agrarian Sciences” and “Earth Sciences” attended the event, which was held within the framework of this year’s Green Consumer Week’s “Environment on Your Plate” campaign and the Global Green Action Week.

The head of the UkrHydrometCenter Administration Support and PR Section, Oleksandr Deziron, welcomed the guests. He emphasized on the necessity of altering our consumer behavior for the sake of conserving natural resources of the Earth.

MAMA-86 Environmental Policy Integration Program Project Coordinator Olena Skrypko presented activities of the NGO and the “Environment on Your Plate” concept, and explained the sustainable food ideas and principles as part of the general sustainable consumption concept.

Anna Tsvetkova, MAMA-86 Water & Sanitation Program Coordinator, focused on the water footprint of foods, i.e., the total volume of fresh water used in their production. She accompanied here lecture with a presentation on “How Much Water Do You Eat?” proving that a person “eats” about 3,500 liters of water a day on an average.

MAMA-86 Information Manager Oleksandr Zheleznyak interactively described 10 steps toward sustainable food, naming each of the steps separately and suggesting that the students would substantiate it themselves.

The participants also received promo kits, which MAMA-86 had developed for the campaign, and watched online “The Meatrix” animation.

Please see pictures from the event on the MAMA-86 Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.525051150911146.1073741847.190090101073921&;type=3

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Green Consumer Weeks in Ukraine – week-long concentrated awareness campaigns aimed at popularizing environmentally responsible consumption and focused on one of important themes of sustainable consumption – have been carried out since 2012 by the Ukrainian National Environmental NGO "MAMA-86" with support from the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation and in collaboration with various partner organizations.

The Swedish Society for Nature Conservation has been conducting similar campaigns in their country in October for many years running. These campaigns have helped significantly increase public awareness of advantages of environment-friendly way of living, develop a legal framework that encourages sustainable consumption and prohibits or limits supply of environmentally harmful goods and services, as well as form a circle of eco-responsible producers and sellers who, on their part, further the transition of the Swedish society toward more sustainable consumption behavior.