“Awareness of environmental issues is the first step to their solution. We wish our citizens were more active. Thus, we offer them the free of charge support of our experts and guidance through the often confusing network of responsibilities and decision-making procedures,” says Kirill Osin, director of Eco Mangystau.
The Public Consultation Centre recently helped citizens of Aktau suburbs to clean-up an illegal medical waste dump, and a new fence has been erected to protect people from wastewater discharge from Mangystau Nuclear Power Plant MAEK – Kazatomprom; the illegal dump of toys in Aktau has been eliminated, and new waste containers have been installed at the Saura canyon.
“The smallest thing every one of us can do is to take care of the environment of our street, our microdistrict or village. We will show the people how they can plant and grow trees in hostile climate and prepare their own compost to fertilize poor soil,” explains Julia Kalmykova from EcoMuseum Karaganda who came to share her experience.
At the Public Consultation Centre of Eco Mangystau in 4th microdistrict, a new Shady Tree Avenue of 10 trees will be planted on Saturday – and everybody is welcome to join. Every visitor of the Saturday Open Doors Day in Eco Mangystau will get his or her own pocket guide on solutions to the most frequent environmental issues with useful contacts and templates. The guide advises on how to protect trees from felling, how to determine the quality of water in wells, or what to do when the state authorities are inactive or not responding.
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The Public Consultation Centre of Eco Mangystau is operating within the project “Enforcing citizens’ rights and public participation in decision making on environmental issues – practical implementation of Aarhus Convention in Mangystau”, aimed at strengthening civil society by improving the living conditions of residents in Mangystau region of Kazakhstan. Funding for project was provided by the European Union in the amount of EUR 336,120.
