The Cayman Islands Chamber of Commerce launched a new environmental initiative Wednesday aimed at individuals, households, businesses and organisations here.
Years of environmental neglect have damaged our coral reefs, depleted our marine life and protective mangrove swamp, and polluted our air and water supply. If we don’t change our approach to the environment, the long term consequences to our health and economy could be devastating.
The Chamber is asking everyone take an environmental pledge to change their habits to help preserve and protect Cayman’s limited natural resources for future generations.
When a pro-active and environmentally aware society takes actions like these, there are many benefits for all residents, including reduced medical and social costs, and increased tourism.
Many people want to do something to help the environment, but there seems to be a lack of leadership in motivating people to act. So the Chamber of Commerce is spearheading an initiative to get people to stop just talking about it, and to actually act in protecting and preserving the environment.
The Chamber is asking residents, households, businesses and organisations to choose at least one action from a long list of options to adopt as a standard way of doing things.
For the individual, that action could be keeping the air conditioning thermostat set no lower than 78 degrees. Or it could be a simple as turning off the water while brushing your teeth. Or it could be something a little more challenging like bringing your own cloth bags to the grocery store instead of taking store-provided plastic bags.
For businesses and organisations, some of the actions include introducing an office paper or printer cartridge recycling programme; introducing energy-saving products, lighting or appliances; or organising a clean-up team for the Earth Day Roadside Clean-up.
The Chamber is also asking residents to let them know if they can think of any other practices that can help save the environment.
There are dozens of things we can all do, some of them very easily, to help protect our fragile environment. It’s up to each of us to decide to stop being selfish and realise this earth is not ours to destroy.
We congratulate the Chamber of Commerce for taking the lead in the Environmental Pledge initiative and we pledge to support them in their effort.
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