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Internet
and Environment Protection
Seminar on Environment Information Sharing of China, Japan
and Korea
ZHOU Lin (from Greener Beijing)
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen:
Good morning. I feel extremely honored to attend
this seminar in the term of environment protection among
China、Japan and Korea.
The world has entered into the digital era.
All kinds of information flow fleetly in the wide space.
The communication and share of information have become more
important than ever. And the Internet serves as a medium
at this point. I don't want to mention numerous advantages
of Internet here. What I want to discuss now is the relationship
between Internet and environmental protection.
In China, the popularization of Internet was
just within several years. However, we are delightedly to
notice that with the mushrooming of all sorts of commercial
websites, environmental websites also take a place among
them and come to their grandness. From government to civilian,
the exchange of information of environment and the share
of resources are stepped by the popularization of Internet.
Greener Beijing Volunteers is an environmental NGO in China,
which is originated from Internet The Volunteers gather
at Greener Beijing and try to do something together for
the deteriorating environment. The website of Greener Beijing
is the first and most popular non-governmental environmental
website in China. It provides a network platform, which
contains a great volume of environmental information for
share, and act as a bridge between the interested individual
and different organizations.
At the same time, we started some characteristic
special columns, for example: "Salvation of Tibetan
Antelope", "Green Beijing for Green Olympics",
"Green Power", "Say No to Wild Life Product"
and etc. These columns attract a lot of participation and
support from volunteers all around. "Online Green Community"
of Greener Beijing is an active environmental virtual community,
and is the first of its Kind in China. It becomes an Internet
base for all the environmentalist and experts for information
exchange and coordinated efforts of action. Up to now, the
registered number of online volunteer has reached 2,000,
and visit per day is up to 20,000, which ranks the No.1
among all the environmental websites. Different methods
are employed to disseminate knowledge on environment protection,
to promote environmental awareness and public participation.
Together with the practical environmental education and
environment protection campaign, Greener Beijing takes full
advantage of Internet to make concerted and effective effort
to protect our one and only globe. We have carried out several
successful and famous environmental campaign in China. In
China, Greener Beijing have also wide and friendly cooperation
with other NGOs, Media circle and relevant government institution,
etc. Website Greener Beijing has distinguished itself as
the only non-profit award holder in several prestigious
Internet awards in China. Among all the honors we received
include:
CIS Top 100 Chinese Website List
99'National Internet Application and Design Award
98' China Homepage Design Competition Award
Ford Conservation & Environmental Grant 2001'
Bringing the role of Internet into full play is the most
important characteristics for Greener Beijing to stand out
of among other NGOs in China.
The motto of Greener Beijing is: Think Globally, Act Locally,
Nurture Green Strength from Internet.
Various methods are employed to disseminate
knowledge on environment protection, to promote environmental
awareness and public participation. In 1998, we started
to disseminate the ideas of separate collection of waste
and the callback of used batteries, We also help volunteers
in Fujian, Liaoning and other places to promote separate
collection of waste and specially, collection of used batteries.
In the January of 2000 we opened the project of "Save
Tibetan Antelope". And in April Greener Beijing launched
"Website Union - Save Tibetan Antelope", which
by now have more than 100 websites participated in it. At
the same time, the volunteers of Greener Beijing designed
exhibition plates、posts、fly sheets and culture T shirts
on their own, associating more than 30 leagues from different
universities in Beijing ,jointly unfold the activities of
exhibitions、no-benefit-performances、sales of work、lectures
and collections, which gave rise to intense resounds. In
August, "Paradise on Fire" was accomplished by
Greener Beijing volunteers. This song was composed for Save
Tibetan Antelope Campaign. As the first Internet song in
China, Heaven on Fire has gained much press attention. This
campaign is praised as the biggest commonweal campaign in
the Internet history in China.
April 2000, We launched A Green Beijing for
Green Olympics campaign with Doctorate Class of Environment
Science Department, Tsinghua University. Together with specialists
and scholars, we make full explanation of how will a green
Beijing a green Olympic will be and what is its affect.
Feasible advices are also given to address the existing
environmental challenges. September 2000, Greener Beijing
Tableware Bag Campaign was launched. Volunteers made tableware
bags by their own hand and distribute them to public to
promote the idea of reducing the use of disposable chopsticks
and other disposable goods as well. From November, we held
Environment Forums in cooperation with Knowledge Workshop
of Beijing Evening News. Speeches and discussions were held
on different topics from Sand Storm, Green Olympics to NGO's
efforts. Many environmental specialists and scholars were
invited as lecturers. November 2000, in cooperation with
the pop singer - Chenlin, who have been awarded the title
of Green Ambassador, we launched Publicity Performance Tour
Music Calls for Environmental-friendly Living. In the January
of 2001,we collaborated with two NGO in Beijing to develop
the project of "Green Power", impelling the progress
of clean energy in China.
In 2001, we also launched campaign Say No to
Wild Tortoise Product from Hainan Yangshengtang Pharmaceutics.
We protest against the TV ad. which publicize the use of
wild life product. We also call the public to boycott this
kind of product and gained wide public support.. Then in
March, volunteers visited Miluyuan to have environmental
education activities there, observing birds, mourning the
endangered species and helping the construction of the environmental
education base. We also organize tree planting on the barren
hills in the suburb of Beijing. What's more, during the
long holidays as National Day and May Day, we started series
activities of "Approaching the Nature": camping
beside the Great Wall, feeling the beauty of nature, observing
birds, camping, cleaning up the Great Wall. Both "Environmental
Awareness Promotion Tour in the Bar" started in July
and "The Environmental Education to the Kindergarten
Child" which began in November were new attempts to
publicize the awareness of environmental protection. The
result proved to be quite successful. It was the great efforts
of these volunteers that Greener Beijing was awarded "The
Ford Conservation and Environment Grants" in 2001.
More than 400 environmental organizations had applied for
the prize.
In down-to earth deeds, we all the more realize
that Internet can and should to exert a more important role
in the publicity of environmental protection. Internet promotes
the effectiveness of our work, and makes a better use of
resources. Here came out the problem of the cooperation
between NGOs and government ones and the cooperation among
the NGOs. Though most of the environmental institutions
of our government and environmental NGOs have their own
websites, the exchanges and cooperation are still few and
far between. In addition, as a result of the degree of recognition
and the direction of media circle, the public's attention
to environment is still limited. Thus, what we'd like to
do is to strengthen the exchange and cooperation, realize
the mutual benefits. We'd like to attract more people by
more creative ways rather than the traditional ways. And
we'd also like to penetrate our ideas into the general public
in some easy-going atmosphere and thus to educate the people.
Since most people attracted by the net are young people
who are ready for new things, and also since Internet is
such a thing that young people love to see and hear, diffusing
ideas through Internet is effective and will lead to a better
result.
On the other hand, the speed of Internet and
its characteristic of eliminating the physical obstruction
make the acquisition of information much easier and quicker,
which play an important role in promoting the environmental
industry.
It seems safe to say that besides the improvement
of public consciousness on environment through the publicity
and education, another important environmental problem to
be solved is to develop science and technology on environment,
the extent of which is reflected on the development of the
environmental industry. The environmental problem is a global
one, which demands the joint efforts of all the human being.
In order to resolve the environmental problem, we should
firstly make it a collective work. Thus, the share of environmental
information becomes extremely important, while Internet
makes it possible. And the share of information will inevitably
speed environmental science and technology and environmental
industries.
Having such a conception in mind, we are faced
with another problem that is how to share. Perhaps we will
think to make a website to lay out our techniques and environmental
products. However, the space of network is so big that it
can only be subscribed as "VAST". The possibility
for our website to be clicked is quite low. That is to some
degree, our share is only a kind of share formally. Then,
how can we realize effective share?
Take an example. There is a kind of game in
Chinese temples called "to feel the Fu(blessing) ".The
rule of the game is as follows: You stand facing a wall
which is over a decade paces away, with a "Fu"
on it. You should firstly memorize the location of the word
, then open you eyes to feel it according to your memory
of the location. If you are able to feel it, it means that
you will have a quite lucky following year. Otherwise, a
mediocre one. Most of people will miss it, some miss a little,
some miss it a lot. If we look upon the times that people
feel the blessing as the clicking rates, then the best ways
to increase the rates (ie: to share blessing together) is
to write more Fus(blessing) on the wall or write the character
Fu much bigger.
It is the same that in order to make our environmental
information shared and exchanged in a more effective ways,
in the first place, we should increase the number of visitors.
Of course, we are not targeting at increasing the times
to be clicked aimlessly, but the effective visit, that is
the times for us serving as a network node to meet visitors'
inquirers. We try to accept pertinent environmental nodes
as much as possible and link them dynamicly. The most two
obvious advantages among the plenty benefits are as follows:
a) To increase our effective visitor
Serving as a professional platform for exchanging environmental
information, we ,through a series of plans and publicity,
will make it more influencely and famous ,at the same time
guaranteeing its authorities. Meanwhile, we have the catholicity
on the terms of environmental information and technology,
which makes us easy to be demanded. And because of the professional
assortment, our visitors are more pertinent, that is the
effective visitors.
To make the share of information more effectively and specially
and thriftly.
b) Every professional website has a fixed group of visitors.
The construction of platform will provide several decades'
times' even hundreds times' volume of potential browsing
to these member websites. In that way, we are able to realize
our aim to share of information more effectively. With the
leaguing of more pertinent websites, the specialization
of our website will increase continuously, while at the
same time the expense to sustain the platform descending.
To sum up, Greener Beijing wishes to build a nice homestead for mankind. Paying attention to our living space and coming up to environmental problems make us see it more and more clearly that no one is able to escape from the name list of peace breakers who pollute our environment. Meanwhile, no one is able to escape the name list of victims who suffer from the exasperating of the environment. Everyone is not only the casualty of the environment pollution, but also the maker of it, however, can also be the controller. More than a slogan and a topic, environmental protection is a systematic science, a consciousness, an idea and a way of life. Environmental protection demands attention from government, industry circle, scholars and the general public. Environment Protection is a shared responsibility of all nations. The share of the environment information is also key for the effective and wide environment protection cooperation, policymaking and coordinated action.
We hope to have a further discuss with all
the friends who are interested in our ideas. Your letters
are also welcomed. Our E-mail address is as followes: info@grchina.net
Thanks for your attention.
Translated
by Greener Beijing volunteer: Wang leyan.
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