In the frames of the International Year of Biodiversity Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East (RAIPON) held a poster contest for indigenous children of Kamchatka and Tomsk areas. On the posters schoolchildren were to show the life of their villages and the ecological problems of their regions. During the V Summit of the Arctic Region Leaders in Moscow the posters were exhibited in the conference hall where the participants of the Summit from Canada, USA, Norway, Greenland and Russia had a chance to take a glance at the life in distant Russian native villages. It was quite obvious that the main problem of Tomsk area is oil exploration while in Kamchatka it is mainly poaching and garbage pollution. It was not easy for the Summit participants to chose and judge.
Each work was interesting and informative. The first place was given to the pupil of the 1srt grade from Tomskaya oblast – Svetlova-Esenina D., the second place was given to Krutski Vasilii from Srednii Tim village of Tomskaya oblast, the third place was shared by Bobik R from Tomsk area and Initiative group “Zabota” (Care) from Kamchatka.
The posters are planned to be exhibited during the 10th Conference of the Parties dedicated to the Convention of Biological Diversity in October in Nagoya, Japan.
RAIPON is thankful the teachers who organized children to send the works to the contest and to the Global Green Fund (GGF) who provided partial support to the contest, so some works will get prizes. In the future the organizing committee is looking for extra funding to publish a calendar with the works of the poster contest.
Taiana Degai,
Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East (RAIPON)
