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SGI News: Global activities for peace, education and culture

SGI-Canada Youth Promote Sustainability

SGI Vancouver members joining the annual "Keeping Vancouver Spectacular" street cleaning event

The SGI-Canada Vancouver Youth Earth Charter Committee has continued to expand awareness of the Earth Charter both within SGI-Canada and in schools and communities in the Greater Vancouver region, launching several projects aimed at giving people hands-on activities to apply the values of respect for the sanctity of life, social and economic justice, and environmental sustainability.

In March 2006, the committee held an Earth Charter exhibition during a public open house at the SGI-Canada Vancouver Culture Centre, where the documentary A Quiet Revolution and the Earth Charter Youth Initiative film The Wonderful World were shown to the hundreds of visitors.

New Projects

In addition, the committee launched two sustainability projects aimed at helping local SGI members and their friends see the positive collective impact of relatively small individual actions. One project was a local battery collection drive, where members were encouraged to drop off their used batteries at the culture center where they would later be sent to a recycling depot instead of to the local landfill.

The other project was a light bulb replacement drive where members were encouraged to install one energy-efficient compact fluorescent light bulb in their home to reduce unnecessary energy usage. A regional sustainability organization, the Fraser Basin Council, donated 300 compact fluorescent light bulbs to distribute to households that participated in the program.

A mini Earth Charter exhibit at the launch of the SGI-Canada Vancouver Battery Recycling Project

In April 2006, the committee participated in an inter-spiritual blessing of the salmon, where representatives from First Nations and the Christian, Jewish and Buddhist faiths expressed their respect for the interconnectedness of life, manifested in prayers at the seashore to the endangered wild Pacific salmon.

In May 2006, the Earth Charter Committee continued into its third year its elementary school Earth Charter workshops. The workshops gave students the chance to share their ideas through interactive activities such as creating and performing an Earth Charter commercial, producing a collage and creating a poster of images representing the values they wanted to see in their future.

The committee also participated in the World Peace Forum and North American Interfaith Network conference also held in June 2006, presenting a multifaith Earth Charter workshop to participants from around the world. Later this year, the committee plans to participate in the City of Vancouver's annual street cleaning program for the third year in a row.

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