24 year old Nigerian Doctor wins UNEP WED Contest, set to report from host country Mongolia

A 24-year-old doctor and environmentalist  from Nigeria has won the 2013 World Environment Day blogging competition after picking up almost half of the close to 70,000 votes cast in an online vote organized by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Charles Immanuel Akhimien was one of ten short-listed bloggers whose entries were posted on the World Environment Day website (www.unep.org/wed) where WED followers could choose their favourite entry. After securing first place with over 31,000 votes, Charles will travel to Mongolia in June 2013 to report on World Environment Day (WED) 2013.

“As a doctor, I have found that the state of our environment is directly related to our personal health, so I have decided to champion environmental issues,” said Mr. Akhimien

“I look forward to seeing some of the two million trees planted across Mongolia’s vast desert regions since 2011, and to observe how Mongolia is using renewable energy by exploiting its huge solar power potential,” he added.

Over 100 international bloggers submitted entries to this year’s UNEP competition on the theme of food waste. The competition was held in support of the ‘Think.Eat.Save. Reduce Your Foodprint! campaign launched by UNEP,the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and other partners earlier this year. Food waste and food loss is also the theme of WED 2013.

For the final phase of the competition, Mr. Akhimien wrote a blog on the role of social media in encouraging sustainable consumption.

In his entry, Charles emphasized the power of social media in ensuring conscious consumption.  He satated that Social media today is an exceedingly powerful tool in the 21st century, as it has become more than just a fad, as it aids the starting of trends by influencing people to change their behavior.

Previous winners of the WED Blogging Competition have reported from Rwanda, India and Brazil.

World Environment Day – organized by UNEP - is the single biggest day for positive action on the environment worldwide. It is celebrated each year on 5 June. Organizations and individuals across the world are encouraged to carry out an environmental activity in support of World Environmental Day.