Beach Clean-up: Sea the Change!
Date: 7 January 2024 (Sunday)
Time: 09:00-14:00
Venue: Cheung Chau
What to do: Costal cleaning and conversation
We are looking for: HKMU students who have passion for nature and a desire to conserve marine ecosystems and clean up the beaches
Language: Cantonese
[The quota is full due to overwhelming response. Thank you for your support!]
Hong Kong is an island city surrounded by the ocean, boasting magnificent coastlines and beaches. However, due to human activities like littering, many beaches are often plagued by litter and pollutants, eventually becoming one of the causes of marine pollution.
To help and protect these natural resources, Sea the Change, a student-initiated service project group, decided to initiate a beach cleaning activity to achieve this goal.
They organized a beach cleaning-up activity at Tai Kwai Wan, Cheung Chau on 7 January 2024. Group members and student volunteers they recruited collected a total of 1185 pieces of waste. 60% of the waste was glass pieces, those glass pieces were small and found all over the beach, while the remaining 40% was plastic waste, including take-away containers or plastic bottles. Additionally, there was a significant amount of plastic waste from the Covid-19 rapid diagnostic test detection sticks.
After the beach clean-up activity, some student volunteer stated that it was their first time participating in beach clean-up activity, and realized the amount of waste and pollutants on the beach were far beyond their expectation. Many of them now understand the importance of protecting the beach environment and expressed their willingness to participate in more beach clean-up activities in the future.
Sea the Change also set up a booth at the Service-Learning Challenge: Student Project Exhibition 23/24 to showcase their service and result of the waste collection, which took place from January 16th to 18th. Additionally, they prepared a quiz competition about marine pollution for everyone to participate in, with the chance to win small prizes as encouragement. They hope that through these activities, they can help to raise people's awareness about marine conservation and the importance of keeping beaches clean, promoting sustainable development and everyday practices.
