For some years now, Tomi Lydia Salami, a former beauty queen and social entrepreneur, has been on a mission of advocacy for clean energy, climate action and environmental protection through her registered non-for-profit organization —Aurora International Charity Foundation. Through the Foundation, Ms. Tomi has established a track record of successfully impacting positively over 30,000 adults, youths and children across the country using various platforms of education, welfare, empowerment and health.
Following the huge successes of her previous projects in Lagos and other states of Nigeria, Tomi has unveiled another out-of-the-box concept which would take environmental advocacy to a whole new level in Nigeria nay Africa. On Thursday 30 May, the J.F Ade Ajayi Auditorium inside University of Lagos brimmed with hundreds of high school students in Lagos as Tomi unveiled her new elite project tagged, ‘Catch Them Young: Environmental Awareness Convention 2024’. The impactful gathering aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on Sanitation, Clean Energy, Climate Action and Environmental Protection.
According to Tomi, who is the Project Coordinator, Lagos maintains a strong position as one of Africa’s top destinations for business, culture, tourism, politics, entertainment, hospitality, sports and more. Thus, “it is imperative that we engage in activities that creatively and succinctly educate and inspire citizens to become environmentally conscious, thereby fostering a sense of responsibility to our planet.
“Our focus for the ‘Catch Them Young’ campaign is geared towards the highly impressionable younger generation as we strongly believe that pioneering an environmentally conscious foundation for children early in life will bring about far-reaching success that will spread further and last longer, thus establishing children as young Environmental Ambassadors for their various communities,” the ex-beauty queen added. The convention supported by Lagos State Ministry of Environment and Water Resources had engaging, interactive sessions by expert speakers and stakeholders in the industry, environmental activists, celebrities and major inspirational figures in Nigeria.