Female conservation group educates rural children on climate change in Kurdistan Region's Rawanduz

Halgurd Sherwani 2021/11/05 14:58

Students and environmentalists pose for a group photo at the entrance of a school in the Kurdistan Region's Rawanduz. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women)

Kurdistan Rawanduz Erbil Kurdish Enlightened Women Krg Masrour Barzani Green Education Project Dilband Rawanduzi

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – In rural areas Rawanduz, a mountainous subdistrict located in the Kurdistan Region's province of Erbil, a female Kurdish environmental activist group is actively working to raise awareness among local schoolchildren about the threats posed by global climate change.

Established in early 2021, Kurdish Enlightened Women is a Rawanduz-based environmental group that aims to spread science-based awareness of the cumulative effect of human behavior on the earth's ecosystems as part of efforts "to protect the earth," according to a self-introductory message the group shared with Kurdistan 24.

Aside from its educational programs and support of conservation projects, a secondary but central goal of the group is to increase girls' interest and engagement in the sciences.

In its Green Education Project, five female activists educate children aged 10 to 13 at a village school in hopes of not only protecting the local environment but also stimulating the young minds with whom they come in contact.

One of the environmentalists holds a plastic bottle of a soft drink, explaining the waste's adverse effects on the environment. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women) — An environmentalist holds a plastic bottle from a soft drink, explaining the adverse effects such waste has on the environment. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women)

"This program focuses on the role and importance of villages in the ecosystem and the dangers of urbanization," the group said. They added that they aim to familiarize the children with their environment and the creatures that live in it.

"Education is the strongest way of solving some of the environmental problems and facing climate change in developing countries," Belan Abdul Khaliq, a co-founder of the platform and the project's coach, told Kurdistan 24.

Less than five months after their initial incorporation, they won a grant from Germany's Goethe Institute's Guan Eden Environmental Awareness Program, which, according to the institute, supports efforts of "cultural creators and environmental activists living in Iraq."

Pupils pick up litter at the yard of their school in Rawanduz sub district of Erbil. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women) — Pupils pick up litter at the yard of their school in the Kurdistan Region's Rawanduz. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women)

"I was alone in the past, but now I am working with a bigger [team]," said Dilband Rawanduzi, the group's founder.

Although all the effects of climate change are not always clearly visible in nations around the world, the threat of droughts and flooding when rain does fall are consequences that can affect everyday life in both Iraq and the autonomous Kurdistan Region.

A pupil stands to make a presentation on environment. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women) — A pupil makes a presentation on the environment to her class in the Kurdistan Region's Rawanduz. (Photo: Kurdish Enlightened Women)

Prime Minister Masrour Barzani announced on Tuesday that the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) had joined the COP26 climate summit to accelerate action against the global threat of climate change.

Over 100 leaders, accounting for more than 86 percent of the world’s forests, have committed to work together to halt and then reverse forest loss and land degradation by 2030 in the Glasgow Leaders’ Declaration on Forests and Land Use.

Early on Friday, a group of environmentalists in Erbil began planting over 50,000 oak saplings along 120 Meter Road, a circular thoroughfare that surrounds much of the capital city.

The local Hassar Organization is undertaking the effort through its One Million Oak Trees Project which aims to conduct the planting across Erbil.

“Our main objective behind the project is combating the threat of climate change,” Gashbeen Idris, the project’s supervisor, told Kurdistan 24 on Friday.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)’s park engineering department has allocated the planting sites for the group whose members first started the process of cleaning and preparing the land on Friday prior to dotting it with young trees.