Environmental Drawing Competition

The main objectives of the Environmental Drawing Competition are: • To help children develop a sense of respect and care for the natural environment; • To enable students to express their thoughts and ideas of the environment they live in; • To raise awareness in schools about the importance of the natural environment and ways of preserving it; • To demonstrate student knowledge about the electricity wastage and natural greenery of the UAE; • To help students realise that each individual has a social responsibility to contribute to the protection and preservation of the environment Our world today faces a plethora of environmental challenges and students must be trained in global environmental protection. Therefore, EEG offers the young generation in the UAE with a platform to express themselves about environmental issues at such a young age. This also ensures having more thoughtful and conscientious adults in the future. EEG is attempting to equip these students, who will be the most important generation in the wake of environmental degradation, with the skill sets to realise and implement solutions that will bring about a shift towards sustainable modes of production and consumption. In 2016, EEG received a total of 805 entries from 203 schools with a total participation of over 50,000 students. The topics of the 2016 cycle were: ‘Sharing Our Planet’ and ‘Responsible Consumption’ 2017 was declared as being the ‘Year of Giving’ by the UAE government. EEG included this in the 2017 cycle of the Competition by offering the following topics: ‘Giving Back to Nature’ and ‘Gifts of Nature’. The Competition was also opened to older students (12-16 years) to envision their future planet through the topic, ‘Sustainable Cities and Communities’. A total of 1094 entries were submitted from 262 schools with a total participation of over 75,000 students. The Environmental Drawing Competition is growing phenomenally every year. In 2017, we received the highest number of participating schools and students since the inception of the programme in 2004. In 2017, we have been able to impact over 50,000 students by raising awareness, providing them with a suitable platform, and awarding them for making the effort to be involved in environmental issues that really matter. EEG has been successful in using this Competition to spread the message of environmental responsibility and recognising the champions whose commendable efforts will help shape the future of the planet. To provide an insight on the growth and impact of the Competition, we have compiled the following participation numbers: 2004: 300 students 2010: 695 students 2015: 744 students 2017: 1094 students Also, in terms of participating schools: 2004: 52 schools 2010: 140 schools 2015: 196 schools 2017: 262 schools EEG has several plans in the pipeline to increase impact of this initiative. We would like to open this Competition to other countries in the Middle East too. However, as we do not receive any monetary sponsorship currently, this is not feasible. For stakeholders looking to get involved, we would encourage the entity to be a partner/sponsor of this programme. We look forward to partner with like-minded NGOs to enable us to roll it out in neighbouring Arab countries. We also hope to rope in the financial support of responsible companies within the private sector. The inclusion of professional famous artists would be a welcome step as they can be involved in judging the artworks of these aspiring young artists and also give some valuable tips to them.