“Forests – a Gift for the Future”
Last March 21, the City Council of Baião marked the World Day of the Tree and the Forest with the performance of several environmental education activities in the Serra da Aboboreira, where 173 7th grade students from the 3 municipal school groups participated.
The activity involved the Municipal Volunteer Firefighters and is part of the Municipal Plan for the Defense of the Forest Against Fires and the Municipal Education Project.
The initiative has as general objectives to awaken the community to the importance of trees and forest areas in the stability of the climate and in the maintenance of life on Earth.
It also aimed to promote the involvement of Volunteer Firefighters, who work in the prevention and defense of the forest, allowing them to demonstrate, through the promotion of educational activities aimed at children, their functions within the forest sector. The volunteers showed the students the various firefighting tools and made a simulation. Both activities have attracted the attention of the young participants.
This year the main objective was to raise awareness and educate the school population about the importance of the forest, by teaching the youngest measures to defend the forest against fires, as well as the main safety measures and behaviors that they must adopt in the event of a rural fire.
The Vice-President of the City Council, Pinho Silva, says that the initiative, “is a way of sensitizing the population to forest preservation, as a fundamental pillar of the environment, especially the youngest, as responsible for the future of the planet”.
The municipality of Baião has the largest green area in the entire district of Porto and, “this alone is enough to increase our responsibility to know how to preserve and care for our forest”, said Pinho Silva to the young participants, asking them to adopt responsible and environmentally friendly behaviors.
