The current Miss Universe Botswana, Larona Kgabo, addressed Girl Guides and Scouts from around the country who gathered at Thornhill Primary School on Wednesday, March 28 to celebrate their 2012 World Thinking Day.
Inspired by the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 7 of ‘Ensuring Environment Sustainability,’ the event went under the theme ‘We Can Save Our Planet.’
The MDG 7 states that the poorest people in the world are the ones who will most feel the effects of environmental degradation and climate change. Therefore, ensuring environmental sustainability is a critical foundation for ending this poverty. In addition, girls and young women of all ages around the world are also differently and disproportionately affected by the consequences of environmental degradation and climate change.
As the Guest of Honour and a role model for young people, Miss Universe Botswana delivered inspirational messages to young girls in attendance. Masa Primary School was the only government school that participated on the day and, coincidentally, is the school that Miss Universe Botswana went to as a kid.
She observed that most participants on the day were private schools. However, she commended Masa for the wonderful job done in grooming its pupils and suggested more participation from government schools. Larona also encouraged the excited crowds of Botswana’s future leaders to think hard about the future of their planet as it depended on them and the state of their surroundings in terms of cleanliness. She went on to stress the importance of gratitude, especially when giving and receiving as she felt this could make the planet a wonderful and harmonious place to be.
Environmental sustainability is the seventh of eight areas of focus made by 189 world leaders at the United Nations Millennium Summit in 2000. It is part of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS) Global Action Theme. Therefore, Miss Universe Botswana’s messages aim to encourage Botswana girls and young women to make a personal commitment to change the world around them by linking to an important agenda: the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals (MDG).
