STAR partners with international media for Earth Day

MANILA, Philippines — For this year’s Earth Day celebration tomorrow, The STAR has partnered with 17 other media organizations worldwide to highlight stories that aim to address environment-related problems. 

Led by Paris-based social business initiative Sparknews, the group – called Earth Beats – would feature stories that present local solutions to the global problem of waste and pollution. 

“As Earth Day approaches on April 22, alarm bells are ringing more and more loudly. The unbridled technological development of recent decades has generated astronomical quantities of highly polluting and rarely recycled waste, while the extractive industries necessary to produce the goods we use devour natural resources,” said Sparknews founder Christian de Boisredon.

“It is the overexploitation of these resources coupled with the excessive use of fossil fuels and chemicals that has degraded the air we breathe and the land and water upon which our survival depends,” he added.

Boisredon noted that human activity is at the center of environment degradation, noting the massive extinction affecting 60 percent of vertebrate species populations and the decrease of the available fresh water worldwide.

“And yet there are women and men around the world undertaking initiatives against waste and pollution,” he said.

“They are initiating zero-waste movements, finding new alternatives to plastics, focusing on reforestation or developing high and low-tech devices capable of cleaning our oceans, rivers, land and air. Each one is hoping to stem the devastating effects of pollution and help protect life on earth,” added Boisredon.

For the Philippines, the stories that would be featured are the successful solid waste management program of San Fernando City, Pampanga and the innovative air-cleaning paint developed by Boysen Philippines.

Joining The STAR for Earth Beats are Hast e Subh (Afghanistan), La Nacion (Argentina), Yicai Global (China), Le Figaro (France), Kathimerini (Greece), El Heraldo (Honduras), The Hindu (India), Haaretz (Israel), Corriere della Sera (Italy), L’Orient le Jour (Lebanon), L’Economiste (Morocco), The Nation (Nigeria), Delo (Slovenia), Dong-A Ilbo (South Korea), Tribune de Geneve (Switzerland), 10vor10 SRF (Switzerland) and CS Monitor (US).

Earth Beats is part of the Impact Journalism Movement, an international partnership of leading media organizations that aims to put the spotlight on concrete solutions that address social development problems and help achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

The featured stories will be released throughout the week starting tomorrow on philstar.com and @PhilippineStar Facebook and Twitter accounts.