MALHB Prepares For Green Initiative Award
Written by Aziz Idris
Saturday, 14 May 2011 04:29
Bandar Seri Begawan – Preparations are on the way for the upcoming ‘2011 Youth Go Green Initiative Awards’, which will take place in conjunction with the National Environment Conference (NEC).
The award is organised by Asia Inc Forum in partnership with Alcoa, Butra HeidelbergCement, Total and HSBC and in collaboration with the Science, Technology & Environment Partnership (STEP) Centre, and Ministry of Education.
One of the participating schools for this prestigious award is the Hassanal Bolkiah Arabic Secondary (Boys) School (SMALHB).
The Weekend Bulletin caught up with the students recently to explain on their proposed entry entitled ‘From Kitchen Waste to Self-Sufficiency Back to Kitchen’.
Eighteen-year-old, Ak Muhd Wafiuddin Pg Hj Zukarnain, said that this year’s project revolves on their chosen topic ‘Water Conservation’.
Through the Energy Club and Environmental Club and cooperation from various departments in SMALHB, “We have managed to recycle wastewater from washing rice, fish and prawns, collected separately from the school’s kitchen,” he explained.
He went on to say that the wastewaters are then used for watering three plots of plantation, whereby each plot contain three different species of vegetables; Cucumber, Chilli and Okra or Lady’s Fingers.
According to data collected during harvest, watering plants using prawn’s wastewater has the best result as the leaves and vegetables grows bigger than the other plants from the respective plots.
“After harvest, the decomposed vegetables are mixed with cow dung and kept in an air tight cylinder container for three to four weeks.
This process of anaerobic digestion – when bacteria degrade biological material in the absence of oxygen – is how we produce Methane Biogas.”
Ak Muhd Wafiuddin explained that the biogases (methane) are used for domestic cooking in the school’s kitchen, “… and the whole process is repeated, hence, coming back to our project’s title ‘From Kitchen Waste to Self-Sufficiency Back to Kitchen’.”
“The whole process took us roughly around seven months to complete and the final report of our project will be submitted to the 2011 Youth Go Green Initiative Awards.”
These techniques have also been practised in schools around the world including Malaysia, India and the United States.
The students also shared some challenges they faced during the whole process with “time factor” being the most dominant.
“The students have other priorities in school such as examinations,” said Hjh Saidah binti Hj Ismail, a teacher in SMALHB, who is one of the project advisors.
“But the students have shown their dedication to their work.
I hope that by joining NEC, this would be another step forward for the students to understand more on the importance of sustainable development,” she added.
SMALHB have won a few environmental related awards in the past years including the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Initiative Award for School and Institution Category during the Energy Day, May 24th 2009 organised by the Energy Unit as well as the Art and Sculpture Category in conjunction with Earth Day in May of 2010.
Asia Inc Forum are still welcoming entries from both government and private schools from all level.
The deadline for submitting applications is on May 20, 2011 at 4.30pm.
The ‘2011 Youth Go Green Initiative Awards’ is an environmental project that was initiated, created, implemented by students or student bodies that are innovative, creative and original which demonstrates significant value and impact.
All projects should have a measurable environmental or social impact and, ideally, will have demonstrated significant progress by the application deadline.
This year’s theme is ‘Saving the World, Saving our Future’.
For further information visit their website www.asiaincforum.com or call 2226555.
— Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin
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