Lake Kivu’s cleanup Report For IdeasForus By Eliode and Daniel

 

Lake Kivu’s cleanup Report

 For IdeasForus
By Eliode Bakole and Daniel Mastaki

Introduction

Waste management and cleanup on the coast of Lakes or oceans is one of the five pillars of sustainability and daily battle of IDEASforUs. It is in this regard that the IdeasForUs DRCongo Branch has held its first cleanup activity on Saturday 19 September 2020 in Kituku Market, on the coast of the Lake Kivu in Goma/DRCongo. In this activity IdeasforUs DRCongo branch invited the AJCPE which is a grass root organization for the bigger impact.  

1.   Preparation of the activity and progress

This Cleanup activity was the answer to the environmental problems identified by the participants (students) who attended the Hive meeting on Saturday 12^th September 2020 at Maison des Jeunes in Goma. Everything was done in the strict respect of the measures to stop the spread of COVID-19. For this reason, every participant was given a facemask. Gloves were also given to avoid any contamination from the waste.

      Topic

“Cleanup activity in Kituku Market, on the coast of the Lake Kivu in Goma/DRCongo.”.

      Date/Time/Location

The cleanup activity was held on Saturday 19th September 2020 in Kituku Market, on the coast of the Lake Kivu in Goma/DRCongo. Three hours were enough for the team to finish the activity. It started from 6:30’am to 9:30’ am.

      Participants

Some of the students who attended the HIVE meeting were our guest. Interestingly new faces were identified. Apart from these students, we had the company of father Jean Pierre who is the president of the AJCPE and some members of his office. In total 23 people participated in the activity.

      Progress

-      A bus was hired for transport of the partidipants,

-      Students arrived at the Lake at 6:30am on Saturday,

-      Spades, empty sacs, gloves, face masks and rakes were bought for this end,

-      The activity ended at 9:30 am,

In the end, Eliode Bakole wrapped up the activity and recommended all the students to be the role models in their universities and living places for a cleaner and safer environment.

          2. Outcomes

 Below are the results from the Cleanup activity:

·         21 students attended the clean up activity,

·         15 meters along the lake were cleaned up,

·         27 full sacks of waste (Plastics bottles, plastic bags, used clothes, used face masks, peelings and rest from food, plastic ropes, etc.) were pulled out of the Lake.

·         People around and the users of the beach were positively impressed and encouraged the Ideasforus DRcongo team to keep up the good work but also learned from our experience, 

·         All the participants agreed to be the stewards and carry out the message of needed waste management to the general public,

Conclusion and recommendations

 The health of us and the planet depends on a cleaned and safe environment for all the beings. Therefore it’s the responsibility of all us to make our places better through sustainable solutions.  

We now recommend:

·         All the students and the youth , to be the stewards and community mobilizers in order to achievement of the SDGs and reduce waste in our lakes and oceans,

·         IdeasforUs to keep supporting our branch for more equipment such as gumboots, nice gloves, overalls, etc.