Dear ECO Volunteers, partners, supporters and friends,

Our sincere thanks to every one of you for being involved in our activities over the past year and your continuing involvement and support for our efforts.

There were many challenges in 2009, including the H1N1 influenza outbreak and the global economic situation. These factors saw schools limit their student engagement programmes and also resuted in less than forthcoming financial support. These unique circumstance did not only have an impact on us, but the community as a whole. We had to restrategize for the year with the limited resources that were presented, yet continue with our ongoing work. In the end, the journey was meaningful and successful.

Despite the circumstances, we manged to explore new initiatives while strengthening current ones, and break new ground on the international platform. We achieved all this with the continued support from every single one of you.

Explore

Maximizing online tools

Being the leading youth-led environmental organisation, it is vital for us to keep up with online tools to reach out to more young people. Today, youths are able to keep up with our activities with the following tools:

1. Scribd: reports of our programmes
2. Youtube: videos of our programmes
3. Smugmug: pictures of our programmes
4. Twitter: follow us to be kept posted on our programmes and environmental news
5. Facebook: be a fan of us and also our group to be kept abreast of our programmes

Running small scaled pilot projects

In the past year, we have also come up with a few creative initiatives with youth volunteers to improve our outreach to the public more meaningfully. These include the following:

• ECO Mall Tour With kind support from Capitaland to use its first green mall, Sembawang Shopping Centre, and volunteer staff support from UPS, volunteers were trained to engage the public on how one can go green even at malls with our buying choices. This one day event concluded with very encouraging outcomes for both volunteers and the public. More details are now being worked on with relevant partners to build on this successful pilot into a year long exciting programme which you can be a part of.
• ECO TV After some training for the enthusiastic hosts and crew, we have begun shooting for this innovative means of engaging youths. We have learned much from this experience and you can stay tuned for this in the coming year for the official premiere of ECO TV.
• United Nations University (UNU) Regional Centre of Expertise (RCE) Together with local environmental NGOs, private partners and government agencies, two consultation sessions were held to identify if and how we may be able to establish a local RCE to promote the education on sustainable development in our region. We successfully concluded the sessions with a submission to UNU for its approval

Strengthening Local Activities

Dunk It Programme

Our annual "Dunk It" programme, piloted in 2006, has grown from strength to strength. Beginning as a means to engage the public during the National Day Parades from 2006 to 2009, "Dunk It" grewn to include the annual Chingay Parade in 2009 for the first time. Our pilot partnerhsip with the Peoples' Association saw 200 ECO Ambassadors successfully convey the litter free message with the public. For the ongoing "Dunk It" programme for the National Day Parade, SMRT came in to give its maiden support for 2009.

Youth Olympic Games

We also had a trial run of our engagement outreach at the One Year Countdown for the Singapore Youth Olympic Games (SYOG) and Clean & Green Singapore (CGS), as a build up towards its full roll out in 2010 for SYOG.

Earth Hour

Building on last year's success, we partnered WWF Singapore once again to further their Earth Hour 2009 campaign to reach out to all the zones in Singapore through the various Community Development Concils (CDCs). This enabled us to spread the energy conservation message to over 100,000 members of the public in the heartlands, through the 1,500 youth volunteers that included many of you.

EXPRESS! Publication

The publication went through a make-over with its debut on Earth Day (22nd April 2009) week along Orchard Road with support from Jurlique. You will be able to get EXPRESS! every quarter online and also a free printed copy at all Starbucks and Pet Lovers Centre outlets (while stocks last!).

RE-LIVE

As an annual event where youth takes stewardship of our environment, RE-Live was held for the second year running in 2009. The event continues to bring together youth to engage the public to "Re-think their way of Living". This year, it was held at Bugis Junction, with the kind support from Capitaland, in commemoration of World Environment Day (5th June 2009).

National Youth Assembly

The National Youth Environment Forum embraced the feedback from its youth participants to grow it into a year long engagement with youth on local environmental and sustainability policies. Hence, we had our inaugural National Youth Assembly in August, held at the Old Parliament House, with the support of The Arts House. The Assembly also paid tribute to the 50th Anniversary of Singapore's self-governance, along with the appointment of our first Prime Minister in 1959. The number of youths taking part mirrored the number of original Assemblymen appointed: 51. After two fruitful days of debate and discussion, the youths emerged with findings that will be presented to the Singapore government ministries. We seek to improve future session with your valuable input. Please find details of proceedings at http://www.nationalyouthassembly.org/

International Day of Climate Action

As part of the International Day of Climate Action on 24th October, ECO Singapore (co-facilitated by the 350.org movement) conducted two events: an aerial photographic shoot and a 'Flash Mob' at Speakers' Corner and the La Salle School respectively. Our action aimed to educate the public of the importance of how one can change our personal habits to reduce our carbon impact. This event was held in Singapore in partnership with the Vegetarian Society of Singapore as part of the largest international movement of this decade with over 180 countries taking part in 2,000 actions worldwide.

International Activities and New Ground

Our involvement in the international arena included several ground breaking intiatives to create a world of eco communities, promoting the concept of global citizenship, where everyone takes responsibilities of our own lifestyle both at grassroots and policy levels.

Growing ECO International

We successfully launched our first international office in Indonesia on ASEAN Day - 8th August 2009. The office in Indonesia is led by Mr Iben Yuzenho Ismarson as its President/Founder and his team of self motivated indonesian youth leaders. This is a first step forward for ECO to take on a facilitator role in the region, and promote sustainable consumption of urbanites through like minded young people. Expect more to come from this exciting new partnership between both countries, and learn more at http://www.eco-indonesia.com

United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (UNCSD)

The annual conference in New York is a unique platform in prompting governments to adopt policies that promote sustainable development in their respective countries. ECO Singapore has been sending delegations since 2006 and in 2008, the delegation established a formal blog on ECO Singapore's efforts at UNCSD to document their journey of the negotiations, and give a voice to youths who were not able to be there physically.

World Leadership Conference

Opened by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director, Mr Achim Steiner, and the British High Commissioner, His Excellency Mr Paul Madden, the inagurual World Leadership Conference drew over 300 youth leaders from over 15 countries to come together and explore the possibility for a low carbon future economy through a five-day intensive programme at the Singapore Management University (SMU). The outcome was brought back by participants to their respective countries and presented to their governments. The outcomes were also integrated as part of the youth declaration for the Climate Change negotiation in Copenhagen.

United Nation Climate Change Conference / Conference Of Parties (UNCCC COP15)

The eventful year concluded with ECO leading a delegation of 15 self-funded youths to the United Nations Climate Change Conference (also known as UNCCC COP15) in Copenhagen, Denmark. The team took on several leadership positions as part of the Youth Constituency, working with over 2,000 youth all over the world to push countries for a more legally binding agreement. The delegation had the privilege to conclude their session with a meeting with our Prime Minister Mr Lee Hsien Loong. The team picked up the COP14 blog and continued to use it as a tool to educate and engage with other youth who did not have the opportunity to be at the negotiations.

Towards 2010

In the coming year, there will be four key pillars for ECO to focus on. They are as follows:

1. Establish and Improve Existing Public Engagement Activities/Programmes

   We would like to strenghten the existing processes and its public outreach effectiveness of the key programmes mentioned above. Looking forward, we seek to build on their successes to do a better job in reaching out to the community, and engaging them meaningfully.

   You can also expect the pilot initiatives of 2009 to be much broader in scale for 2010.

   Our recently established Creative Department will be looking at refreshing the branding of our initaitives, and projecting our youth-based image.

2. Improve Volunteer Management and Development Programme

   Our volunteers are the bloodline of the organisation and its various activities. One way of rewarding and recognising these dedicated volunteers is to constantly improve their management and development, and provide and enriching experience when they volunteer.

   An ECO Training Programme for all volunteers is now in the review stage where we are getting endorsement by UNEP to roll it out in Singapore, and eventually in all the other ECO offices. This will be coupled with an ECO membership with possible benefits coupled with it to promote sustainable consumption.

3. Develop and Promote Environmental Enterprises

   We recognise innovation to be the key to ensuring the financial sustainability of our organisation.

   We have ECO Ads (on EXPRESS!), ECO Travel Services, ECO Talks and the ECOSPHERE Mentoring Hub as some of our prototype Environmental Enterprises as revenue vehicles for the organisation.

   We will be scaling up these enterprises along with new initiatives such as the ECO Shop, ECO Agriculture Trading and ECO Courier Services.

4. Building Strong Partnerships: Local Partners, SYOG and the UN

   We look forward to continue our relationships with our NGO partners by including them as much as possible in our activities. Similarly, we look at improving our working relations with the relevant government agencies and corporations that we had the privilege to serve along side with over the past years.

   Volunteers will have the opportunity to be involved with the historic and inaugural Singapore Youth Olympic Games (SYOG) as ECO Singapore has been appointed to work with the SYOG and NEA as key trainers for ECO Ambassadors that will be deployed throughout the Games season.

   Given the increased involvement with the United Nations, we will be getting our NGO consultation status with them, along with endorsements on some of our long term initiatives/programmes.

Conclusion

With your continued support in terms of your time, skills and enthusiasm, we will continue to engage and empower more youths to take ownership of our environment, be more informed consumers, and make a difference by making eco living a lifestyle, starting with ourselves.

It's all happening because we care for our Earth.

With Warm Regards,
Wilson Ang
Founder and President