Caritas India Head Office Delhi commenced the celebration of World Environment Day 2022 by planting a mango tree sapling on the premises of CBCI. The guest on this occasion, Mr Thomas Preindl from Caritas Austria did the honours of putting the sapling in the ground along with assistance from Fr. Paul, Executive Director, Caritas India in the presence of the entire Caritas head office staff. Later in his address, Fr. Paul spoke about the climate crisis inflicting the mother earth right now manifested in the form of unprecedented weather conditions. He urged the need to think in long term by planting in mass to help alleviate the consequences of Global Warming.

The plantation activity was followed by a Staff Orientation programme on Climate Change under the theme “Only One Earth, So to Care the Mother Earth” led by Dr. Haridas, Lead Climate Justice. The programme was organised to impart various resilient practices to Caritas staff which are “ecologically sensitive, economically viable, socially adaptive, and culturally acceptable.” The programme was in line with Caritas India’s larger plan to align with international agreements on climate change such as the 2015 Paris Agreement, agenda 2020 and Goal No. 13 of SDG.

The session began with a presentation by Dr. Haridas warning about many different crises looming over the world that have jeopardized the normal living conditions for all living beings. Quoting examples from present days, Dr. Haridas said the water scarcity in Cape city and insufficient rainfall in vegetation-rich Madagascar should serve as a caution for all humanity to act now. Adding to the list of current-day crisis is the glaring number of flora and fauna that has disappeared from the earth due to human activities. Dr Haridas lamented the rise in the occurrence of natural disasters like floods, earthquakes, landslides, droughts and cyclones around the globe. While emphasizing the need to care for the planet earth, Dr Haridas called for reducing the consumption of energy and plastic and practising mass plantation.

The programme then transited into introspection on the recently conducted “Green Audit” for Caritas India head office. The Green Audit was a two-month-long exercise, carried under the leadership of Ms Shimray,  Lead – Training & Development – CIDAL, that aimed to delineate the exact number of energy consumption and overall wastage in Caritas India’s Head Office.

To mitigate the crisis of overconsumption, Dr. Haridas shared the idea of having a “green protocol” in place. In order to combat the climate crisis strategically Dr Haridas, also recommended evaluating the Carbon footprint of each employee of Caritas India in the near future.

At the end of his address, he implored everyone to curb their personal use of leisure services such as lifts and non-CNG vehicles to reduce emissions on an individual basis. He also advised women to use cotton sanitary pads instead of synthetic ones.

Executive Director Fr. Paul also delivered his keynote address, and urged everyone to put these inputs into practice. After which Fr. Paul along with other staff members released two posters for World Environment Day namely, “Each One, Plant One” and “Earth Needs Your Care”. Caritas India has created a ripple effect in the community to promote plantations and different programs have committed to planting a tree. In the FARM Northeast program itself, 51,000 trees will be planted, the Surakshit Shaishav program in West Bengal will conduct a plantation drive in 5 locations, whereas Sanjeevani has committed to a plantation in 4 locations in Gujarat and 2 in Madhya Pradesh. Similarly, other programs will also observe the event by planting trees and increasing the green cover in the program areas.

In the end, Ms. Shimray gave her concluding remarks, urging everyone’s cooperation to walk the talk when it comes to saving our environment for future generations. She ended the session by delivering a note of thanks to all the presenters and attendees.