The second day of the One Young World Summit focused the sustainability of our planet.
OYW ensured delegates absolute comfort while enabling a truly sustainable by banning plastics, and only catering vegetarian meals for example. An effort to offset participants’ carbon footprints was also made by partnering up with manufacturers of electric cars and encouraging the most practical and sustainable mode of transport and movement – walking.
The youngest United Nations member, Jayathma Wickramanayake, spoke about how young people have the collective responsibility to drive humanity towards progress. She challenged participants to think logically with values and beliefs that unite people while creating a road map towards a sustainable future.
EOH Eco Warrior and EOH OYW representative, Vandana Satgoor, says: “When I started at EOH three years ago; I believed it then as I do now – as the biggest technology company in South Africa with the largest ICT market share for two years in a row as awarded by Gartner, EOH is well poised to implement the technology solutions to realize the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals for South Africa”.
The discussion that businesses exist in a broader ecosystem raised some eyebrows. It was said that 71% of the planet’s ocean is water, but this water is drowning in plastic. Jeremy Darroch from Sky PLC shared a campaign launch at the event: focused on tackling the plastic issue in our oceans and recognizes that if we endeavour to save 30% of the ocean by 2030; this action has the propensity to generate life under water. He expressed that governments are only at the 7% threshold. In an effort to save the ocean from plastic many organisations have banned and divested in plastics as part of their procurement process. EOH is on this journey, with a focus on removing single-use plastic throughout EOH.
Read more on some of the discussions around sustainability that took place at the OYW Summit HERE.
