Unilever, UNDP celebrate IWD 2022 by driving plastic clean-up, awareness at NCC

To improve the health of the planet, more than 100 women have joined hands together to create awareness on plastic clean-up at Narayanganj City Corporation as part of the International Women’s Day 2022 campaign ‘Diversity for Sustainability’, said a press release.
The one-day campaign was designed to raise community level awareness on plastic collection and women’s empowerment by various activities, such as plastic clean-up drive in the city, awareness sessions, household visit, plastic collection site visit and paying tribute to the women waste workers by the diverse groups of
women.
The campaign has been organised by Unilever Bangladesh in collaboration with NCC, UNDP Bangladesh, Eco Social Development Organisation with the support of Glow & Lovely Career on March 2, 2022.
More than 100 women started the day with an early morning city clean-up, and the group represented Unilever’s female managers, UNDP’s female and male staff, community leaders and female water workers of NCC.
The women were divided into 10 groups and spread throughout the main part of the city. This clean-up was a symbolic representation of women’s contribution to tackling plastic pollution at NCC.
After an hour of clean-up drive, the diverse groups of women gathered at the Ali Ahmed Chunka Auditorium for a discussion and paying tribute to the waste workers for NCC, where Selina Hayat Ivy, mayor of NCC graced the programme as the chief guest along with Shamima Akhter, head of Corporate Affairs, Partnerships
and Communications of UBL, Sakshi Handa, human resource director of UBL and Yugesh Pradhanang, project manager, Livelihoods Improvement of Urban Poor Communities Project of UNDP Bangladesh.
The session started with the speech of women community leaders and female councillors, who expressed their deep sense of gratitude toward the mayor, Unilever and UNDP for taking such a remarkable campaign and joining hands to make NCC free from plastic pollution and make it cleaner and greener.
The panellists of the session also echoed and recognised the contribution of waste workers in driving the collection of plastic and identified it as a critical step for the city’s environment.
Selina Hayat Ivy, mayor of NCC said, ‘All of us are powerful women and, we need to be courageous enough, confident and visionary to reach our full potential and face any challenge. I appreciate that hundred powerful women come forward with such an encouraging initiative of plastic clean-up at NCC. The plastic collection
project of Unilever and UNDP is a unique one, and I believe it will give us a sustainable plastic collection model for NCC, which will not only set the example but also inspire other city authorities to adopt the same model for a better plastic waste management system.’