World Environment Day opened in Tromsø

Drawings made by children and a great show opened the World Environment Day in Tromsø Sunday.

- This is fantastic, said Minister of Environment, Ms Helen Bjørnøy, when she spoke about the service in Ishavskatedralen in Tromsø yesterday.
The Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu lead the service, which had several international guests participating. It ended with all the participants walking down to the sea in order to bless water.

Later the same day the minister ad H.K.H.Crownprince Haakon opened an international exhibition with drawings made by children from all over the world,

UNEP also launched a book about sustainable tourism in polar areas. Svalbard is particularly focused and thus Ms Helen Bjørnøy presented Norways plan regarding environmental tourism.

The main theme for the World Environmental Day is ”Melting ice- a hot topic?”. Icemelting is one of the biggest challenges of today. The ice is utterly important in order to keep the temperature stabile. More than 1.5 mrd of people are depending on water from rivers and they again are affected by the icemelting.

Yesterday ended with a liveshow broadcastet on television where snow an icemelting was the main topic.