On a Tuesday evening in February, the media space of Luuppi Youth Centre in Kontula is filled with a joyous atmosphere. Members of the Youth Council, Leena Xu, Jasmine Lam, Harry Fogelholm and Oona Laine, have come to finalise their videos on littering for social media.
“During the project, we learned new skills related to videography and facts about littering. This stuff was super fun to make and realise with friends, particularly because we got to use a lot of imagination! However, some facts came as a bit of a shock to us, such as the fact that Helsinki is spending 14 million euros of tax funds a year on sanitation!”, say the Youth Council members.
Last autumn, the City of Helsinki Environmental Services began cooperating with Youth Services with the aim of putting together a social media campaign about littering for young people. The campaign is part of the Littering Mitigation Action Plan, one objective of which is to engage and involve Helsinki residents and young people through a communication campaign. Since last autumn, members of the Youth Council have been brainstorming, shooting videos and coming up with ways to challenge other young people in cooperation with Youth Services and Environmental Services.
The Litter-free Helsinki campaign for young people will start in the second week of April on the social media channels of Young People’s Helsinki. All of the videos were created by the Youth Council, featuring the litter mascots of the Litter-free Helsinki campaign, Tuula and Börje.
Challenge for all young people in Helsinki
In addition to the social media videos, the Litter-free Helsinki campaign for young people is challenging all young people in Helsinki to keep their local environment litter-free.
“We’re challenging all young people to rise to the occasion – together we can make our environment less littered and encourage people to think about their own consumption choices and generate less litter!”
The members of the Youth Council are worried about the littering of nature and recent articles in the media claiming that young people do not care about their environment.
“We think that young people care about littering and their environment very much, because we still have our future ahead of us. Everyone should worry about littering more, not just young people.”
Young people actively taking part in littering mitigation work
Environmental deeds to mitigate littering are nothing new to young people – in addition to the Litter-free Helsinki campaign, events such as environmental cleanup events held at youth centres in spring and autumn attract plenty of young people to take part and tidy up their local environment every year. Additionally, Youth Activity Centre Silmu, which carries out environmental activities with young people, opened its doors in Pasila last autumn. The Youth Budget is used to organise broader projects, such as the Vihreyttä Malmille (‘Green for Malmi’) project this summer. The project will involve young people tidying up the surroundings of Shopping Centre Malmin Nova and planting vegetation in Ala-Malmi.
The City of Helsinki supports young people’s activities in a variety of ways. The City provides free-of-charge environmental education activities and materials to schools, daycare centres and residents. The Harakka Nature Centre contributes by providing children and young people with information on the Baltic Sea and littering, archipelago nature and sustainable lifestyles.
