Check this article for December’s contribution to the Green Business Page on businessbarbados.com by Nicole Garofano, Administrative Director of the FCT, challenging all to have a ‘green Christmas’: http://businessbarbados.com/green-business/wishing-you-an-eco-friendly-christmas/

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On Wednesday October 26 , 2011, an historical event took place at around 4:45pm in the evening – the Grand Unveiling of the Hastings Mural!

After some three weeks of work by our tiler, Rusty, based on the design work of David Spieler, the mural was ready to be unveiled. But how to unveil a 100+foot piece of artwork on a public wall?

Cover it with reel end newsprint from the Nation Publishing of course! After some 45 minutes Vicky, Ayana and Nicole managed to tape up the mural with paper that will of course be recycled, in order to have a special ceremony where children’s unwrapping skills were the order of the day!

Seen here, thanks to the photography of Tracey Simpson, children were more than happy to do the unwrapping!

The ‘unwrapping’ of the mural followed a formal ceremony where Dr Julia Horrocks, Director of the Barbados Sea Turtle Project spoke of the importance of Barbados’ role in conserving the sea turtle habitats and indeed the species, which is the focus of the mural project. Dr Leo Brewster , Director of the Coastal Zone Management unit, complimented the concept and was happy to see a solution to the ‘blank wall’ that was part of the Boardwalks’ development, and Mr Tyrone Lowe, Chairman of the National Conservation Commission spoke of the continuing partnership with the FCT with this project no exception.

All who attended the ceremony and the ‘unwrapping’ felt the sense of a worthwhile project being completed for generations to come, of both visitors to Barbados and locals alike, to admire.

It is with thanks to our sponsors and partners to this project that it was able to be taken from idea to reality:

• David Spieler
• Earthworks Pottery
• Tourism Development Corporation

Gold Partners:

• KPMG
• Barbados Fertility Centre

Silver Partners:

• Blakeys Bar and Restaurant
• Art Splash Cafe
• Tapas Restaurant

And of course our FCT Platinum Sponsor, Barbados Light and Power Co Ltd

Thanks also to our media partners on the day, The Barbados Advocate (Thanks to Ms Kerri Gooding) and to Barbados Today (Thanks to Mr Shawn Cumberbatch) as seen in this image.

Thank you to everyone for enabling such a beautifully educational landmark!

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With the Future Centre Trust’s experience in waste management projects, the Travel Foundation saw the organisation as a natural partner as it continued a hotel focused programme to reduce environmental impacts.

Project Coordinator, Lani Edghill, has been hard at work on this project for some months with a number of assistant interns, initially from the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, – students Tanya King and Simonique Welch and supplemented by students from the Bellairs Research Institute Field Studies Semester out of McGill University, Laura Pinkham, Adrienne Pacini and Chris Wong. Also joining the team is Ayana Moosa, who has been working with the FCT in a number of roles since March, and has found an appropriate avenue for her interest in recycling in this project.

The Travel Foundation has this to say on the concept and their goals for this initiative:

“The Travel Foundation has been working with hoteliers in the Caribbean since 2009 on a project to save water and energy,  called ‘Switch off, Save Big’. This project assisted hoteliers in reducing their water and energy consumption and,  to date, collectively the hotels have saved close to £1 million on their water and energy bills. This has resulted in them being able to utilize the savings in other areas of their businesses, including retention of staff.

In May 2011, the Travel Foundation partnered with The Future Centre Trust, Barbados,  and extended the programme to include waste prevention and reduction. The partnership aims to ensure that hoteliers receive the relevant tools required to implement a waste prevention programme in their hotel. This project will run until May 2012, providing training on implementing waste reduction measures and recommendations.

It is estimated that by implementing the reduction measures, hoteliers can reduce their overall waste by 10%. This can also have a positive impact in terms of reduction on the hotel’s overall expenditure. All hotels involved in the project will receive a final waste audit report, along with their reduction comparisons over the one year period.

Hoteliers interested in reducing their water, waste and energy consumption should visit www.thetravelfoundation.org.uk/greener-accommodations for free online tools.

This project is part of a range of water, energy and waste reduction initiatives run by the Travel Foundation. The Travel Foundation is a UK charity that cares for the places we love to visit. You can find out more at www.thetravelfoundation.org.uk

The project has so far completed work at the following hotels, each in different stages:

• Dover Beach Hotel
• Divi Southwinds Hotel
• Southern Palms Hotel
• Plum Tree
• Coconut Court
• Accra Beach Hotel
• Bougainvillea Hotel
• Crystal Cove
• Worthing Court
• Butterfly Beach

We look forward to seeing some major reductions of waste that would otherwise head to the landfill from this project with a minimum of 50% of waste audited thus far, recoverable for composting or recycling.

Thanks to Lani for leading the way on this one and for all of our student contributions and to Susan Mahon and Jill Parlee of the Bellairs Research Institute for their support and recommendation of this project to the McGill students for this year.

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To all of those people who are trying to contact us re Clean Up Barbados either by fax or phone, please bear with us as we are having technical issues with our phone line and fax line. If you can please scan your forms and email them to us, we would be grateful. In the meantime, any queries can be answered via email to info@cleanupbarbados.org or to the FCT generally at info@futurecentretrust.org.

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Persons interested in being part of the puppeteer troupe to present the Bri and Luk Puppet Show to Primary schools from September are invited to participate in this Workshop taking place August 20 through 22.

The workshop will include basic principles of using the puppets which have been individually designed and made to match the characters in the Bri and Luk Book Series along with some basic climate change education to compliment to script which will be used.

Ms Kelly Kirkham, a Canadian Puppeteer and puppet creator will be facilitating the workshop and looks forward to sharing her knowledge of many years of experience in this field with the participants.

Persons with an interest in drama, environment, teaching, puppets are invited to send in their details to briandluk@futurecentretrust.org to register for the workshop.

The workshop is being funded by Shell Western Supply and Trading, Air Canada, Barbados Light and Power Co and the Canadian High Commission.

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On Wednesday June 9, Lani and Nicole joined members of the Barbados Environment Community Network (BECoN) and members of the Grassroots Video Productions community in a training programme of Project Development basics given by Nicole Leotaud of the Caribbean Natural Resource Institute (CANARI).

The session was the last of a series of comprehensive training provided to the BECoN network over the past eighteen months and was a fitting way to end the series. Nicole provided great insights through her
many years of project development in the Natural Resources area. She is now the Executive Director of
CANARI and we were very fortunate to have her assistance. She was able to share content developed
by the Trinidadian NGO, Venia Apwann who kindly offered their assistance by sharing their content.

The seventeen attendees appreciated the training, with comments such as “the best training every experienced” and “a great way to learn” being common in the evaluation of the day.

Thanks to Nicole and to Nicholas of the Barbados Marine Trust, Secretary of the BECoN network
for their great work.

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