Flashionably green

Instead of playing video games, watching TV or just hanging out this summer, 12-year-old Liang Hao was busy with his classmates Liang Yunshun and Chen Haokun gathering environment protection tips from their daily lives and compiling the ideas into a flash animation.

"We got the idea from shopping in the supermarket with our parents. By paying attention to the packages and labels, we found it wasn't hard to choose the environmental friendly products. We realized that to protect our environment, everybody could and should start from basic daily life," says Liang, a primary school student in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

Earlier this month their animated flash entitled "Environmental Protection Shopping" won the top prize at the Volkswagen Green Olympics - National Youth Flash Animation Competition, sponsored by the China Ministry of Environmental Protection and Volkswagen Group (China). Their production was lauded by judges for its innovation, creativity and positive viewer response.

"We are happy that our work has been recognized, and that more people can learn the importance of environment protection as well as broaden their knowledge from our flash," says Chen.

"In the future, we will think other ways to create more flash projects with environmental themes," adds Liang. "There are still many things we can do for the environment protection and for a green future."

Volkswagen Green Olympics - Nationwide Youth Flash Animation Design Competition is an important part of the Volkswagen Green Future Environmental Education Initiative (GFEEI). It uses flash animation as an innovative way to popularize the spirit of the Green Olympics and to motivate the enthusiasm of young people to show off their commitment to environmental protection values.

The Flash Animation Design Competition received 369 pieces of works from 19 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions across the country when it debuted in June.

Students in regions such as Tibet, Qinghai and Inner Mongolia were also involved.

Through two rounds of discussions and scoring, the final shortlist came up with 20 award-winning works and 30 outstanding works.

"It's far beyond our expectations that in terms of the innovative topics covered by these award-winning works, students not only showed their observations of the little changes around them, but also used their imaginations to elaborate on the future of the planet," says Molly Yang, director of corporate communications at Volkswagen Group (China).

Some of the flashes illustrate the blue sky and green water of their early memories to call upon more people to protect the environment and stop destroying nature. Some adopt a personalized animated perspective and described the energy-saving and environmental protection facilities of the Olympic stadiums. Some even bring their imagination into full play with environmental suggestions and recommendations.

"Vivid pictures full of children's fun combined with their little voices leave a deep impression on everyone as its it's a meaningful lesson on environmental protection and the Olympics," says Yang.

"This competition provides an opportunity for young people across the country to keep up with the surrounding changes through their eyes and understand the philosophy of the Green Olympics. The innovative and popular form of competition further narrows the distance between our young people with the undertakings of environmental protection," says Jiao Zhiyan, director of the Center for Environmental Education and Communications (CEEC).

Yang tells China Business Weekly that Volkswagen Group (China) required the students to use the prizes for more environmental initiatives.

"As the automobile partner of Beijing 2008 Olympics and an outstanding corporate citizen in the Chinese society, Volkswagen always shoulders the responsibility and duty to facilitate China in achieving the objectives of sustainable development," adds Zhang Suixin, executive vice president of Volkswagen Group (China). "We will support the environmental education initiatives for young people and enhance the overall social awareness of environmental protection through various activities so as to honor our solemn commitments to the Green Olympics."

Volkswagen GFEEI is a three-year program jointly run by CEEC under the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Volkswagen Group (China) since last April with an investment of 8 million yuan.

"The success of the program has made us decide to add to the investment for next year and continue the cooperation with CEEC on environmental education. It must be a sustainable program for Volkswagen," says Yang.

Besides the Flash Animation Design Competition, other programs and competitions such as the Green Classroom Nationwide Lecture Tour, Green Posters in Green Schools, Green Junior Journalist News Reporting Contest, and Green Junior Journalist German Environmental Protection Exchange Program were also held in 2007.

The GFEEI Olympic City Tour, which ended in the first half of 2008, also included environmental lectures by Ingrid Vahland, a German environmental adviser, Olympic champions, Olympic etiquette experts and environment protection educators to schools in seven Olympic cities.

The Green Classroom was also held in Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region this October.

(China Daily 12/15/2008 page8)