Big win for Newstead Primary
Newstead Primary School from St Mary on Thursday won 10 computers and $100,000 after placing first in the 2017-18 staging of the LASCO Releaf Environmental Awareness Programme (REAP).
Eleanor Nelson, a Peace Corps volunteer at Newstead Primary, said the students collected 132,000 plastic bottles as part of the exercise. She said the children devoted themselves to the protection of the environment.
Nelson said the school had only one working computer before Thursday’s win.
“It was an incredible feat,” she said.
Meanwhile, Lascelles Chin, founder and executive director of the Lasco Affiliated Companies, said REAP represents LASCO’s deep concern for the future of Jamaica, and invested $43 million in the programme, designed to build environmental awareness, education and development among students. Chin said that a total of 500 schools have been involved, with 27,000 trees planted and seven million plastic bottles collected. “We continue to encourage schools to maintain their vegetable gardens. This has been a tremendous success, as revenues collected by many schools exceed $500,000 each per annum. LASCO remains committed to REAP,” he said.
The LASCO founder and chairman said that Fort George Primary and Infant School, recipient of the 2017 REAP Award, was able to secure a grant of $4.1 million from the Culture, Health, Arts, Sports and Education Fund to improve water catchment, reading and recreational facilities at the institution.
Audley Shaw, Jamaica’s agriculture minister, said he is planning to moot a proposal for the establishment of a law that will make it mandatory to separate solid waste from recyclables, including plastic.
He said that separating garbage, which has been practised in other developed countries, has become critical, especially in light of the threats of plastic to the oceans and the environment.