The United Nations Environment Programme (Unep) has announced seven winners of the 2020 Young Champions of the Earth award, the UN’s highest environmental honour.

Among the winners is a 29-year-old Kenyan materials engineer, Nzambi Matee. Ms Matee, who heads ecofriendly construction firm Gjenge Makers, has been recognised in Africa for producing sustainable low-cost paving blocks made of recycled plastic waste and sand.

The annual awards are announced by Unep, whose headquarters is in Nairobi. Seven winners aged below 30 are given seed funding, mentoring and communications support to boost and expand their efforts.

Ms Matee is among seven winners drawn from all over the globe that are transforming their communities through innovative solutions to climate change, pollution and plastic waste, among other environmental challenges.

Portable wind turbines

In the Latin America and Caribbean region, Max Hidalgo won with Yawa, the renewable energy firm that builds portable wind turbines that harvest up to 300 litres of water every day from humidity and mist in the air.

Lefteris Arapakis from Greece (26) has been using the startup Enaleia to train, empower and provide incentives to the local fishing community in efforts to clean up the sea. Fishermen are compensated for collecting plastic waste from the sea, which allows fish stocks and ecosystems to thrive. The firm also recycles the plastics to produce fashion accessories like swimsuits and socks.

Kuwait’s 24-year-old Fatemah Alzelzela won for her work with Eco Star, a non-profit recycling programme that collects waste from schools, homes and businesses in exchange for plants and trees. The firm has so far recycled over 130 tonnes of paper, plastic and metal since its launch in early 2019.

In the North American region, the award went to Niria Garcia from the USA for her annual event dubbed Run 4 Salmon to raise awareness on the Sacramento chinook salmon fish species, and the ecosystem that supports it. She also uses virtual reality to demonstrate the importance of conservation.

For the Asia Pacific region, Xiaoyuan Chen (29) has been feted for his data platform MyH2O, which tests and records the quality of groundwater in a region spanning 1,000 villages in rural China. The platform also educates communities about sources of possible contamination and connects villagers with suppliers of safe drinking water.

Biomass upgrading equipment

Another winner from the Asia Pacific region was India’s Vidyut Mohan (29), whose firm Takachar builds affordable and portable biomass upgrading equipment. Through the equipment, farmers can earn extra income and avoid environmentally harmful practices like burning the remains of harvested crops or weeds. Instead, they use the equipment to convert the crop waste into fuels, fertilisers and activated carbon.

A Unep statement on the award winners issued on Tuesday said the champions were chosen for their revolutionary “solutions to harvest water from the air, recycle plastic into paving slabs, and motivate fishing boats to haul tonnes of plastic waste from the ocean”.

“These young change makers have shown how innovative ideas combined with ambitious action can help solve some of the world’s most pressing environmental challenges,” read the statement.

“Globally, young people are leading the way in calling for meaningful and immediate solutions to the triple planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. We must listen to them,” said Unep executive director Inger Andersen.

Carbon emissions

“As we enter this decisive decade where we work to cut carbon emissions and restore ecosystems, these young champions show that all of us can contribute, starting where we are and what we have. Every single act for nature counts, and we all need to share this great global opportunity and responsibility,” added the director.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the champions were announced online, just before the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, which starts in early 2021.

The awards are part of Unep’s campaign to rally momentum for the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Kunming in May 2021 dubbed #ForNature, and the forthcoming UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) set to be held in Glasgow, Scotland, in November 2021.

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