Walking to Entoto area is part of his weekend pastime for Firew Kefyalew (Associate Professor). He and his family developed the hobby of walking in the park recently and during their walk, they discuss important issues with children about their school, family issues. They develop this culture and made it as part of their life.
“I started walking to Entoto to exercise for health and to generate new ideas. Through time, it became a family culture and I used it to discuss with my children which is more productive than the usual discussion at home” Firew said.
“Personally, to generate new ideas, I choose walking in quite places filled with trees, which makes me productive in my work. I learnt that discussing with family in such condition also makes children productive and makes the discussion fruitful” he added.
Approached by The Ethiopian Herald, Firew stated that while jogging to Entoto area was part of his family life during the weekends mainly on Sunday, Entoto entered to new phase. The beautiful Entoto Park, which was inaugurated on October 2020, becomes a new tourist attraction site which attracts new appetites for visitors.
For the jog-loving family of Firew, the launching of Entoto Park was a new blessing and they continued walking and discussing their family issues weekly in this beautiful park which covers around 14 kilometers.
While walking, jogging and discussing every Sunday in the park, they came to understand that people tend to throw used plastic litters and bottles here and there within the compound of the park rather than the trashcans. As they continued to understand the situation throughout the park and discussed “what they can do” to minimize the problem.
“As regular customers of the park, we reached an agreement not to throw a single waste and plastics even a peel of chewing gum” Firew said. “After a while, we decided as a family to start cleaning these garbage during our walk in the park to fulfill our responsibility to protect and safeguard this beautiful park” he added.
Firew reiterated that they understand the gravity of the problem after they started their cleaning work in the part. Then, they decided to continue cleaning these garbages every Sunday and they make plugging part of their jogging at Entoto. Firew’s family continued this activity for almost a year.
For Firew, this activity strengthens the communication among the family and eased to solve issues with deep discussions. “I taught my children to understand what life means through this mechanism. Similarly, the exercising is helping us for our health. At the same time, we are contributing our side for the environmental protection and safety of the beautiful Entoto Park” he noted.
Currently, with a vision of developing this culture in Ethiopia they named it Plogging Ethiopia. Now, not only Firew’s family, but also scores of people are jogging and plugging at Entoto every Sunday jointly with this nature enthusiast family.
“Parallel to cleaning Entoto Park every week” Firew said “we started awareness creation campaign using different social media platforms with my children. We divided the duty and investing on social media how the wastage is affecting and disturbing the beauty of Entoto Park, it attracts people and a lot of people are joining us,” he added. Then, they are developing the family’s activity to a social movement to protect environment while exercising for health.
As part of their awareness, the family used disseminating evidence based information about the wastages in the park. With the aim of this goal, they publicized every week the amount of wastage they collect from the park and posting their pictures that shows their activities, exercising and cleaning the park. “This activity attracts hiking groups, travel organizations and other voluntaries many investing on environmental protection” Firew added.
Since October 2021, every week 20 to 50 people are participating in this activity. They cover 17 to 20 kilometers every week and collect over 20 kilograms of different wastages mainly covers of packed foods and plastics. Similarly, they develop the culture of discussing on common social and national issues during their jogging in the streets of Entoto Park.
Not only that, they are educating the parks visitors to protect environment and clean their areas. With this blessed activity, they continued enjoying their Sunday at Entoto every week. Firew noted that university students, volunteers, hiking teams and travel agencies are becoming members of the plogging family. “We are enjoying our Sunday with this activity and we will sustain it” he noted.
“People are asking me from Bahir Dar, Hawassa and other cities to start the practice now,” Firew stated adding “I want to make the activity a social movement to be practice across Ethiopia” he stated. It was started in Sweden in 2016 and currently it is practiced in over 40 countries globally, Firew added. This social movement has personal and societal benefits, it is an exercise for personal health and to protect safety of the environment.
By promoting and expanding it, the goal of Plogging Ethiopia is making plogging a cultural practice to promote walking for environmental purpose. It aims developing awareness of handling wastage, cleaning environment at the same time developing the culture of exercising for personal health.
“In Ethiopia mass sport is developing in recent years” Firew stated adding “if the culture of plogging develops, everyone walking in the street can play its role to clean the environment parallel to his exercising” he noted. Hence, those interested to protect the health of their environment while jogging can either join the group or practicing it in their surroundings to develop the habit of cleaning our environment.
With regard to the park, Firew noted that “in the first place the park administration should strictly follow the park’s safety and beauty. In addition, the food and beverage service providers within the park should also fulfill their responsibilities by advising their costumers and by avoiding non-decomposing food and beverage covers of packaging” Mainly, the change should come from the general public and “everyone should know that a single waste represents a person” he added.
Hence, to protect the beautiful natural park of Entoto, visitors should strictly apply the rules and regulations of the park plus fulfill their moral duty in protecting it. New tourist destination sites and parks are developing following the attention by the reformist government; the people should protect the safety and health of these parks by protecting their beauty, at least by refraining from throwing wastes here and there, Firew underlined.
The nature loving family of Firew is now introducing this culture with multidimensional purposes and is calling more people to join hands in developing this culture. It needs nothing, but commitment and passion to bring a change.
Plogging, a combination of jogging and plugging, which promotes walking for sport purposes and cleaning up environment, was originated by a Swedish man, Erik Ahlström in 2016 and currently it’s practicing in over 40 countries across the world. Plogging-Ethiopia is now advocating and promoting to develop this culture in Ethiopia started by picking up litters and plastics while jogging at Entoto Park.
BY DARGIE KAHSAY
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD TUESDAY 28 DECEMBER 2021
