The Knights Tribune – #2 (April 2019)
- EcoKnights
- April 28, 2019
- 4:53 pm
The Knights Tribune – #2 (April 2019 )
Category: Newsletters
Published: Sunday, 28 April 2019 16:53
Message from The Founder
April is a special and busy month for us. Some of the globe’s major environmental celebrations take place this month, commemorating a lot of media attention on the state of the planet. But the question remains, are all these celebrations and events generating sufficient impact to drive change on this planet?
I do believe there is a need to review how we celebrate environmental events to quantify and qualify the kind of impact the events are meant to bring about. Over the last decade, I have witnessed a surge in student-led initiatives aimed at driving through awareness on environmental protection. “In a world that stresses on credible and accountability, it is time we witness more accountability and smart planning from our young students.”
While many of such events start off with good intention, often ignorance, lack of awareness on the actual state of environment and lack of engagement with external stakeholders contribute to reducing the impact of such student-led efforts.
So what I want to bring about is this. Start thinking about WHY you are running such events. Get to defining the purpose of your event, and making sure that the purpose has indicators that can be measured and assessed.
In a world that stresses on credible and accountability, it is time we witness more accountability and smart planning from our young students. With guidance and mentoring, young Malaysians may be able to pave a more tangible way to impact-driven environmental initiatives for the country and its people.
EcoKnights Receives the “Inisiatif Sukarelawan Negara Taman” Award from the Prime Minister
APRIL 2019 | {Award & Achievement}
“…The real people we should be celebrating are our volunteers, as they are the ones who are making a difference…”Putrajaya, 4 March 2019 – EcoKnights, an environmental non-profit organization received the “Inisiatif Sukarelawan Negara Taman” Award from Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad at the National Landscape Day 2019 (HLN 2019), held at Putrajaya Botany Garden. The award recognised EcoKnights for their outstanding volunteering efforts in restoring and rehabilitating degraded landscapes in the country.
“Winning this award was a pleasant surprise. It’s great to be recognised for our volunteer programs. I think it shows that small efforts such as this can grow to shape and encourage the general public to address environmental challenges by taking action.
The real people we should be celebrating are our volunteers, as they are the ones who are making a difference. EcoKnights is merely a vehicle, and the real heroes are the young, the middle age and the senior citizens whom we will be celebrating with soon.” said Yasmin Rasyid, EcoKnights Founder and President.
EcoKnights have initiated a diverse range of volunteerism projects over the years and includes volunteerism efforts aimed at restoring and rehabilitating degraded areas in and outside of the city. From beach and river clean-ups to household waste management campaigns, the EcoKnights volunteerism efforts are often conducted in partnership with government agencies, community groups and businesses such as HSBC Bank, Vanke Malaysia, Starbucks Malaysia, DHL Express Malaysia, Shell Malaysia, Bursa Malaysia, Maybank Foundation, ASEAN Foundation, Edaran Tan Chong Motors, Gamuda Land, Malaysia Marine and Heavy Engineering Holdings Berhad (MHB), Kenanga Investment Bank, MISC, UEM Sunrise, Aveda, edotco, DBKL, MBPJ, MBIP and more.“…This year we are targeting to plant 300 trees and to have 20 clean ups especially along the rivers within Klang Valley. We are keen to have more collaboration with various partners in achieving this goal…”
This 2019, EcoKnights is pursuing higher goals in continuing the effort of restoring and rehabilitating degraded landscapes around Klang Valley. Volunteerism programs and efforts are already in place in which EcoKnights will be promoting to encourage more public and private participation in its endeavor and effort to restore and rehabilitate degraded landscapes around Klang Valley.
“We are thankful to all of our corporate partners, donors and supporters for the environmental volunteer initiatives. This year we are targeting to plant 300 trees and to have 20 clean ups especially along the rivers within Klang Valley. We are keen to have more collaborations with various partners in achieving this goal,” said Fadly Bakhtiar, EcoKnights Programme Director.
The National Landscape Day was initiated on the 3rd of March 1998 as an annual celebration, the effort is aimed at mobilizing a culture of love for landscaping among the people in line with Core 1 of the National Landscape Policy, namely, to popularize love for landscaping.
APRIL 2019 | {Special Partnership}
In 2015, the UN General Assembly adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. But how satisfied are people with the progress achieved? And what is important to them when it comes to sustainability in their daily life and in the workplace? For the first time ever, these questions are the focus of a worldwide survey called the “Global Survey” – and everyone can participate until the end of June 2019.
EcoKnights has collaborated with Global Survey to be one of the contributors to this worldwide survey.
The survey is available at http://www.globalsurvey-sdgs.com in 17 languages.
APRIL 2019 | {Special Partnership}
eMpowering Youths Across ASEAN Programme
by Rebecca Tan
16th February – 2nd March 2019, Gombak – eMpowering Youths Across ASEAN Programme (EYAAP) was conducted by EcoKnights alongside with Frangipani Organic Farm and 10 participants selected by ASEAN Foundation on Building Community Resilience through Circular Economy and Waste Management Practices (Integrated Organic Farming). The project was fully sponsored by Maybank Foundation and was implemented for two weeks (16th February- 2nd March 2019) at Frangipani Organic Farm, Gombak, Selangor. The project was a success, exceeding pre-set targets in various aspects. More than 610 kg of food waste was collected which exceeded the team’s original target by 500%.
The team also produced an educational outreach module about food waste and Black Soldier Fly (BSF) suitable for future school awareness-raising programmes. Through its community outreach efforts, the team engaged and conducted surveys with a total of 283 people, consisting of two school visits (total 90 students), 24 people at the night market, 25 youth volunteers, and 144 people from the Open Day. This number surpasses the team’s original target by more than 100%. Furthermore, there was a strong social media engagement as EcoKnights’ Instagram engagement increased by 0.33% within the two weeks. The team also engaged with Traxx FM (National English Radio) and Bernama (National News Agency)
APRIL 2019 | {Volunteerism}
Breaking Another Record for Log Boom Clean-Up at PPR Sri Terengganu.
by Raisalih Juhan
9 March 2019 (Saturday), Sentul – 26 volunteers from Sukan Anggota Kerajaan Malaysia (MAKSAK) engaged in a River Log Boom Clean Up activity under the River of Life Outreach Programme (ROLPOP) at one of the Gombak River. The activity was facilitated by the EcoKnights team.
The Log Boom Clean-Up began with separating the volunteers into groups of three. The first group was given the task of collecting the trash from the log boom and bring it to the segregation area. The second group was then in charge of segregating the trash and pass them to the third group for weighing and recording. After an hour of collecting, segregating and weighing, the team managed to collect a total of 930.50 kg of trash.
This 930.5 kg of waste has broken the previous record of 510 kg of waste collected in the same log boom. “This is only one log boom and we almost reach a ton. Now imagine if all log booms around Kuala Lumpur have to be cleaned every day, how many wastes do you think we are producing and throwing directly or indirectly into the rivers every day?”, said Fadly Bakhtiar, EcoKnights Programme Director. With that being said, public enrolment in river clean up activities help them to realise the seriousity of the pollution.
| Category of waste | Weight (Kg.) |
| Organic | 192.60 |
| Plastic | 109.90 |
| Paper | 4.20 |
| Cloth | 4.00 |
| Metal | 3.80 |
| Misc | 66.20 |
| Unsegregated | 549.80 |
| TOTAL: | 930.50 |
HSBC SUPPORT RIVER OF LIFE
by Muhammad Hafiz Ardiansyah
27th February 2019, Sentul – EcoKnights in partnership with HSBC held a Community Log Boom Clean Up in Gombak River beside PPR Sri Terengganu from 9.30am to 1.00pm.
The clean up run successfully with 40 volunteers coming from HSBC group, assisted by 15 EcoKnights team members and 2 ERE consulting group officers. The objectives of this Community Log Boom Clean Up are to engage more people with the river within River Of Life project area, and encourage people to do waste segregation & proper waste disposal at their home to avoid the rubbish ending up in the river.
The result for the clean-up is unexpectedly high, with a total collection of 510.9 kg of waste.
Apart from the Log Boom Clean Up, the volunteers also learnt about mudball and its river-cleaning effect in the workshop handled by EcoKnights team members. The workshop took about 30 minutes in total, 20 minutes for the workshop and 10 minutes for the “Mudball Throwing” activity.
If you wish to join our river conservation action or to have some sustainable workshops for your area/school/company, feel free to contact us at info@ecoknights.org.my.Check out the data on the waste collected here.
APRIL 2019 | {Media Coverage}
Yasmin Rasyid interviewed on Astro Awani about Roles of Social Enterprise for New Malaysia
On 27th March 2019, EcoKnights president and founder, Yasmin Rasyid, was interviewed on the role of social enterprise in Astro Awani’s Pilihan AWANI hosted by Rizal Dzulkapli a special segment features views of current issues.
About Tanamera Hearts- A Tripartite Partnership to Benefit Community and The Environment.
Tanamera Hearts is a tripartite smart partnership among Tanamera, The Good Shop and EcoKnights. The aim of this collaboration is to achieve dual goals of improving the livelihood of beneficiaries from marginalised communities and to achieve sustainable environmental development for local communities through entrepreneurism.
Tanamera Hearts comprise of an aromatherapy stone, and a bottle of essential oil, packed in a beautiful dark blue travel case produced by the beneficiaries of the Good Shop. Tanamera Hearts is a perfect gift for loved ones, and also a great travel item if you would love to be surrounded by familiar aromatherapy scents. You can choose from a variety of essential oils to use with the aromatherapy stone.
About EcoKnights
EcoKnights is a non-for-profit environmental organization registered with the Registrar of Societies Malaysia. EcoKnights’ core focus areas are in environmental education and awareness using innovative and creative platforms. More information about EcoKnights can be obtained from www.ecoknights.org.my.
For more current updates on what EcoKnights is up to, do LIKE us on Facebook, Instagram and also follow our tweets.
To ensure you get our latest news, add news@ek-newsletter.com to your address book.
To forward this newsletter to a friend, click here.
Share this content
