From 26-29th January, members of our network across the world gathered in Tallinn and online to envision and create a waste-free future for all of us! During the four-day conference, country leaders, teams and organizers came together under the theme “Embodying Unity”, to learn, plan and inspire one another.
The conference was opened by the President of Estonia, Mr. Alar Karis. He noted that World Cleanup Day has managed to engage nearly all countries on the planet - and that in itself is a remarkable accomplishment. “Let’s Do It World is one of the platforms that offers to bring about change in the mindset of people through education, climate education,” noted the President. In her greetings, the Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), Ms. Maimunah Mohd Sharif pointed out the importance of our joint effort to create a waste-free, healthy world for all.
Together we celebrated the past World Cleanup Day and heard about the success stories of clean-ups in various countries such as Mozambique, Iran, India, Mexico, Estonia and Ukraine. In the latter, nearly 120 000 came to clean up the country despite the war, said the leader of Let’s Do It Ukraine, Ms. Iiulia Markhel.
Within three days of the conference, learning took place under modules ranging from environmental education and circular economy case studies to environmental leadership. Inspiration and motivation poured in from powerful speeches by Mr. Gunter Pauli, an entrepreneur, economist, and author of the book The Blue Economy and Mr. Vishen Lakhiani, the CEO of Mindvalley.
The circular economy case studies presented included examples of cooperation, innovation and solutions coming from scientific understanding of the possible solutions to the waste problem. Among other examples, we heard about the Finnish example of nudging people to live more sustainably from SITRA, how waste can be turned into valuable resource from Ragn Sells and environmental education for a waste free world by NoteAffect. We hope that all participants were empowered by workshops on impact, social media and cleaning up our inner world. After all, you have to take care of yourself together with cleaning up the world!
After intensive learning, the participants of the conference gathered for the annual Awards Ceremony, in which past year’s outstanding activities of our members are celebrated. Nearly 20 awards were presented in the awards ceremony which took in place in the medieval old town of Tallinn, at the House of the Blackheads.
The Team of the Year award was presented to Let’s Do It Ukraine team for their effort to mobilize nearly 120 000 people during the war. Mobilization awards were also given to the team of Let’s Do It Brazil, the biggest engager of people in Latin America, and the teams of Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Afghanistan for their contribution amid conflict, war and environmental obstacles. Let’s Do It Mozambique got the award for being the biggest mobilser in Africa, and the biggest jump in the number of participants at the World Cleanup Day 2022, in comparison to the previous year. Their team managed to engage 2M people from the country which is a remarkable impact. Let’s Do It Mexico was the biggest engager of people in World Cleanup Day 2022 and for that, they received a mobilisation award, too. Congratulations to our network, we are truly amazing!
The next World Cleanup Day is taking place 16th September 2023, see you there!
Let’s Do It World Conference 2023 was supported by European Regional Development Fund, Enterprise Estonia and the Estonian National Foundation for Civil Society. Explore Estonia: visitestonia.com
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