WORLD YOUTHS TO PROMOTE ENVIRONMENT IN BANDUNG

By Andi Abdussalam

Jakarta, Sept 15 (ANTARA) -  Some 1,300 children and youths aged 15 to 25 years from 120 countries will gather in  the West Java city of Bandung to plant trees, create a world city forest and come up with ideas on sustainable development.          The youths will plant the trees in Bandung city's Babakan Siliwangi, a 4-hectare-wide area formerly known as a culinary hub while attending the Tunza Indonesia, an international children and youth conference on the environment to be held in the West Java provincial capital on September 27 - October 1, 2011.          "We have to be grateful for the trust given to us to host the international environment conference," Environment Minister Gusti Muhammad Hatta said here on Thursday.          The conference will be held at the Bandung Ganesha Cultural Hall. The international children and youth conference on the environment is a bi-annual event.         This time, the conference is themed "Reshaping Our Future Through A Green Economy And Sustainable Lifestyle". It aims at arousing the awareness of the world's younger generation toward the importance of green economy, sustainable consumption and others.         "We hope that the youths would have a high care for the environment though educational process, hard work and information exchange," the minister said.          This conference is expected to produce a declaration, 'the Bandung Declaration' and to serve an input for the United Nations Conference on sustainable development in Rio + 20.           The Tunza conference will include a tree planting program and the creation of a grand park, the Juanda grand forest park in the Babakan Siliwangi area which will be declared as a World City Forest and is expected to serve as a monument that will remind people of the importance of the environment sustainability.          "In the  World Urban Forest program, children participating in the  Tunza Conference will plant trees  on September 27," Wahyu Marjaka, a member of the Tunza Conference's organizing committee.           The tree planting activity by the conference participants would be done one day before the meeting's closing.  "Each tree will be given a label with the name of the participant who planted the tree," Wahyu said.        The world urban forest would be surrounded by an auditorium building, residential housing complexes, hotels and the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) campus as well as a nuclear power plant.          "In addition, in the future after the nuclear power plant project is completed, we will try to make the nuclear power plant land into urban forest as well. But this is still a plan " Wahyu added.           The land area of four hectares is planned to be planted with different types of trees that would be provided by Tunza committee. "Later, about 800 trees will be planted. However we are providing about 2,500 trees since the target audience is actually over two thousand," Wahyu said.         Gusti Muhammad Hatta said the Tunza conference was important for the future world which belonged to children and youths. Therefore, they were expected to take part in the protection of the environment.          "We have to make three points of success in organizing the conference, namely success as host, success as organizer and success in the outcome of the conference where the event would provide advantage for the surrounding people.          Bandung has been chosen as host of the of the conference because while the city of Bandung has been widely known  it is also expected to improve further the conditions of its environment.          In the meantime, in an effort to enliven the international environment event, Indonesia's Environment Ministry is preparing a  350-hour cycling trip from Bali, the Indonesia tourist resort island, to Bandung   on the occasion of the Tunza Conference.          "These efforts can contribute to the achievement of the 26-percent carbon dioxide emission reduction target. We want to fight the wasting of energy with the environmentally friendly activity of  cycling," the ministry's spokesperson Dodo Sambodo said after a ceremony to launch an "Indonesia Cycling" campaign in Kuta.          The campaign was designed to welcome the Tunza "Children and Youth Conference on the Environment 2011".           Indonesia has been entrusted to host this conference, and Tunza can be a tool for Indonesia to conduct environmental diplomacy. "With the Tunza conference themed 'Reshaping our Future through a Green Economy and Sustainable Lifestyle.' we hope to contribute to the efforts of making the green economy  a lifestyle," Wahyu said.***6*** (T.A014/A/HAJM/01:00/a014) 16-09-2011 01:0