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Fuelling change with young blood



Mohammad Husni, British Council Country Director Tony Riley, Sulakshana Senanaya, Sikander Sabeer and Anoka Abeyrathne    

From the Asian Youth Summit

Mohammad Husni, Anoka Abeyrathne,Sikander Shabeer,Sulakshana Senanaya


Anoka

The easy way to move on with the world would be to swim along the tide and live your merry-way. If you conform to the hypocritical way in which the world is governed, nobody would dare to question, confront or challenge your ways. Having said that, there are few who strive to make an impact, a change that would alter the course of the man-kind for the better.

‘Global Changemakers’ represents a brigade of vibrant young social entrepreneurs, activists and volunteers from all over the world who strive to challenge the system with the hope of creating a positive impact that would pave the way for a better change.

Charged with youthful exuberance and vigour, they aspire to fight and tackle issues which plague their respective communities. Punch recently caught up with four aspiring, British Council’s Global Changemakers from Sri Lanka, who recently represented the island at the Asian Youth Summit in Delhi.

Anoka Abeyrathne, Mohammad Husni, Sikander Shabeer and Sulakshana Senanayake - the four young Global Changemakers from Sri Lanka represent a new breed of younger generation who are fearless and strong. They were selected to represent the Asian Youth summit in India after submitting their applications and showcasing their projects to a panel of judges through a ‘YouTube’ video. The four of them were selected from 1600 applicants. They also hold the title for British Council’s ‘International Climate Champions’ from 2010 to the present.

The bunch has the right mind-set and the attitude to cope with the challenges and issues that lie ahead. Driven by their creative aspirations, they have been able to come up with projects which have the capacity and the potential to shed light on those who are in need. The projects which may have only been living in their wildest fantasies couple of years back, have already been implemented and put into practice.

Sulakshna, at the age of twenty, has already founded his own organization called ‘CFL Sri Lanka’ which aims to educate, encourage and empower people to use energy efficient CFL Bulbs. Sulakshana aims to reduce the load on the electricity grid by getting more people to use CFL bulbs which he provides free of charge or at very low cost from the money he collects from his organizational activities.

Speaking about his grand project, Sulakshana noted, “Once I was walking around the city of Colombo, I saw a group of people studying under a lamppost. I later found out that 20 percent of people in Sri Lanka have no other option but to do their work in the dark. So I started this project called ‘CFL Sri Lanka’ which actually gives free CFL bulbs to people in villages, as a result of the project; we were able to save 100 kilowatts which is sufficient to power a small village. I want to expand. I want to give CFL panels so that they can generate their own electricity.”

Twenty year old Anoka is working on a Mangrove conservation project which helps the community through eco-tourism and handicraft sale. She hopes to alleviate poverty through environmental conservation. She has been working with Mangroves for more than five years planting more than 12,000 Mangrove saplings.

“The projects have already gone beyond idealism. We have replanted 12000 Mangroves in Bolgoda area and while replanting we are promoting social entrepreneurship as well. The project is a success. Soon there is going to be an online store, so that we can reach out to other people. And we are building partnerships with other countries as well,” Anoka explained.

Sikander has been engaged in a range of practical projects to tackle climate change. His ‘Green the Home’ project mainly focuses on solid waste management and natural resources. ‘Green printing’ - focuses on recycling printer cartridges and toners. Husni is the founder of the voluntary organization ‘Eco Care Sri Lanka’ which focuses on creating environmental awareness among young people through partnerships, workshops and other projects. The foundation is currently working on a project called ‘Green the World’ which raises awareness amongst school communities about the issue of Climate Change and highlights the close relationship between solid waste management.

The Youth Asian Summit which took place recently in Delhi gave them the ideal platform to mingle with their foreign counterparts and share their ideas on how they should collectively work as a group to combat the threats that lies within the Asian region. Sixty one changemakers from twenty three countries gathered at the Asia Youth Summit to build their skills and share best practices across their areas of activism, varying from climate change to poverty reduction to social entrepreneurship. Sharing their experience on the summit, Husni expressed, “The Asian You Summit gave me a wonderful networking opportunity to get further exposure on youth activism in Asia by meeting, interacting and cooperating with likeminded young people from different countries within the region.”

Joining in with the discussion, British Council Country Director, Tony Reilly added, “This is a unique global network of young people who want and passionately believe that they can make a difference in their own countries and the wider world. They dream of doing big things and plan of doing big things. There is nothing wrong with such idealism. You have to dream. You have to inspire others. I am sure the summit must have helped all of them to inspire each other to achieve what may seem unachievable.”

However, with regard to their social work in Sri Lanka, they all felt that an attitudinal change needs to take place among the non-urban community. No matter how motivated they are, the change will not happen if the community is not co-operative. Young blood should fuel the change.

They should be mobilized and come together to address the issues. Expressing his optimism Sulakshana noted, “One thing I learned from the summit was that no dream is too big. One year ago all of those young people might have thought it is impossible, but they are making it a reality, you should at least aim for the moon if you want to touch the stars. The youth in Sri Lanka think their ideas are too big and that they can’t be turned into reality. We have to change that attitude. If you have a good idea, you can make it happen.”

Adding further to what Sulakshana said, Sikander spoke on the dilemma of lack of interest among young people towards voluntary work.

“Voluntarism in Sri Lanka is very low. Most young people are only interested in gaining academic qualifications. But co-curricular activities are important as well, even if we go to a job interview the fact that you have done all those work will hold you in good stead.”

Expressing her thoughts on the difficulties she had on promoting eco-friendly products Anoka noted, “When we introduce an eco-friendly product, sometimes people ask why make an eco-friendly product when you can make something not eco-friendly and gain greater profits. There was a girl from Indonesia at the summit who also had the similar issue. She creates eco-friendly beauty products from rose petals, but she had a problem with mobilizing the community.”

The challenges will always be there, but if the community is supportive, a new breed of younger generation is on the rise, that has the potential, talent and right attitude to take the country to great heights.

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