CAMBODIA. Cambodia Airports has enlisted the help of young people to build awareness of plastic waste through a week-long campaign to mark World Environment Day (5 June).
The key message of this year’s campaign is: “If you can’t reuse it, refuse it.” Each day of the week there will be initiatives which aim to educate all airport stakeholders about the negative impacts of plastic overuse. Activities include:
- Clean walks along the airports’ fences in Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville
- Tenants cutting down on the amount of single-use plastic given to customers
- Inviting 20 primary school students to join a workshop on plastic use in Cambodia and work on an awareness campaign by drawing a communication visual and enter a drawing contest. The results of this workshop will be displayed at the airports’ terminals. Students will then be asked to share their experience with their fellow classmates.
- Environmental awareness sessions, in partnership and conducted by the local NGO SIPAR, for 20 grade three and grade five children from NGO schools.
- Inviting nine associations, who each contribute positively to the environment, to come and present their activities.
- A survey to ask for feedback from tenants and passengers about the World Environment Day events at the airports.
Cambodia Airports CEO Éric Delobel said: “Environmental consciousness must lead to concrete actions and that’s what we have been achieving at the airports for years. A few months ago, we commissioned two waste water treatment plants at Phnom Penh and Siem Reap airports. Other initiatives deployed include streamlining electricity use at the airports’ facilities, phasing out old vehicles and sorting of waste.”
Within the framework of the Airport Carbon Accreditation (ACA), Cambodia’s three international airports (Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville) last March renewed the level 1 certification of a programme aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
VINCI Airports, Cambodia Airports’ mother company, is the first international group to commit all of its airports to the Airports Carbon Accreditation programme. All of them continue to be certified at different levels.
