A team of girls from Brest has won Coca‑Cola environmental competition on waste collection

Belarusians collected over 165 cubic meters of waste during the environmental campaign “Zrobim!” in 2018. The campaign is traditionally organized with the support of the Unitary Enterprise “Coca‑Cola Beverages Belorussiya”

In total, over 1 500 people took part in clean-ups across the country throughout 2018. The Enterprise provided them with all the necessary equipment for waste collection: hand protecting gloves and waste sacks (https://naviny.by/article/20181005/1538740206-zrobim-chyscey-globalnaya-uborka-pod-minskom). 

For the second year in a row, due to Coca‑Cola HBC Belarus’s initiative, over 400 student volunteers from higher and secondary specialized educational institutions had the opportunity to take part in the environmental competition on waste collection under “Let's do it!” campaign. Student girls from Brest State A.S. Pushkin University became the winners of the competition in 2018. They cleaned up from waste the territory of Khaby village (Brest district) and collected 60 large 120L waste sacks.

On the threshold of the New Year, each member of the winning team received the coveted prize - the new Apple iPad. The award ceremony took place on the premises of the Unitary Enterprise “Coca‑Cola Beverages Belorussiya” in Minsk. The participants were greeted by Marina Borovko, Public Affairs Manager, and Elena Onufrovich, Director of the Republican Center for Ecology and Local History, a partner of the environmental campaign “Zrobim!” In addition to the prizes, an exciting plant tour was organized for the winners conducted by Juliana Chernyakova, External Affairs Specialist of Coca‑Cola HBC Belarus.

The girls kept a secret the place where they were able to find such volume of waste. However, they noted that they would not have been able to win the competition without the guys’ help and support, since the bulky waste in the form of metal structures, tires and building materials required the involvement of male strength.

Next year, Coca‑Cola Beverages Belorussiya will continue to support realization and implementation of the existing environmental campaigns and projects, such as the environmental campaign “Zrobim!” (https://by.coca-colahellenic.com/en/media/news/volunteers-of-the-unitary-enterprise-coca-cola-beverages-belorussiya-have-launched-a-new-stage-of-the-global-environmental-campaign-lets-do-it/), clean-up campaign on the territory of the biological reserve “Turovsky Meadow” in Zhitkovichy district, monitoring of the Yelnya bog restoration after the successful completion of “Save Yelnya Together!” project, as well as the new project “Lake Beloye”, the main implementation works thereof will begin in spring 2019.

Most of waste was collected in Brest region - 57.8 m3. The second place took Gomel and Gomel region, where 24.1 cubic meters of waste were collected. Volunteers cleaned up in Minsk as well. Moreover, it was a record figure of 27.7 m3 for the city, and 12.8 cubic meters of waste were collected in Minsk region. In Grodno region almost 14.6 m3 of waste were removed from forests and parks, and in Vitebsk and Vitebsk region - about 16.8 m3 of waste.

Minsk district, in its turn, was cleaned up of 12.8 cubic meters of waste. Traditionally, a lot of waste is concentrated on urban beaches. Cleaning-up the shores of water bodies is especially important as it prevents water pollution. Most often volunteers collected car tires, plastic bottles, and chips packaging. But there was also an unusual "catch": for example, a mobile phone and documents that were safely returned to the owner.