Volunteers remove piles of garbage from Mamzar beach

A large number of volunteers participated in a cleanup drive yesterday along the Al Mamzar beach. The day-long campaign covered about an 8km stretch of the beach and involved the participation of volunteer divers and others. "This campaign is a part of our efforts to preserve our environment. We are encouraging as many volunteers as possible to be a part of the cleanup," said Khalid Salem Sulaiteen, Head of Environmental Emergency Office of Dubai Municipality. "The general public of all nationalities are welcome to join us and take part in the cleanup and family activities at the beach to save our marine environment through a fun-filled drive," he had said. The drive was led by ‘Marasina', a team of volunteers formed by the Municipality last month. Marasina team has five groups of volunteers, including women, who have come forward to help clean up the creek and seashores of Dubai and protect the marine environment. Divers from the Dubai Police participated in the initiative. Aiming to make the drive a fun-filled activity, there was music and volunteers were provided a seafood buffet lunch. The campaign kicked off at 9am from Al Mamzar beach and ended at 5pm. Earlier last week hundreds of students took part in the Municipality's Desert Clean Up Campaign. Municipal officials had said the message to everyone is that if they enjoy or use a place they should leave it clean for others. Last year 5,400 volunteers participated in the campaign and collected 266 tonnes of waste, including 1.5 tonnes of plastic waste.