The young defender of the environment Francisco Vera Manzanares met yesterday with Primary students from CEIP Luis Álvarez Cruz (Las Galletas), El Fraile, Buzanada and La Estrella (Las Rosas), in the Infanta Leonor de Arona Auditorium, to whom encouraged to become “influential in their own environment.” An influencer is not, as we have been told, someone who accumulates thousands of followers. All of you can encourage your family, friends, schoolmates, companies and local institutions to take care of our planet ”, he stressed.
The mayor of Arona, José Julián Mena, proclaimed Francisco Vera, ambassador for the World of the Arona SOS Atlántico Festival, and assured him that “the students of the municipality for many years have been authentic heroes and heroines of recycling, thanks to the My school recycles initiative ”. The young activist invited the boys and girls of the municipality to make the richness of Arona’s biodiversity known to the whole world. Likewise, Vera Manzanares encouraged local institutions and governments around the world to include, when creating environmental policies, the voice of children, in particular, and of women, indigenous populations, and citizens in general ” .
Founder of the Guardians for Life movement, made up of minors around the world who defend the environment, the 12-year-old Colombian activist, who is in the Canary Islands hand in hand with Arona SOS Atlántico, participated, last October, in the presentation ceremony of the program of this eighth edition in Madrid, a few days before going to the Summit against Climate Change in Glasgow (COP26), where he coincided with Greta Thunberg. There, he showed his commitment to this festival to publicize the message of protection of the oceans and cetaceans in Latin American countries. Arona SOS Atlántico has awarded him, also within the framework of the meeting in Tenerife with students, the Festival award in its 2021 edition, as specified by the co-director of this initiative, Martín Rivero, “for his commitment and awareness in favor of life and the planet from so small. In just two years he has been among the 50 most influential Colombians and will soon be among the first ”.
The Councilor for Tourism, José Alberto Delgado, who presented Vera Manzanares with the sculpture commemorating the Arona SOS Atlántico 2021 Award, invited the children to continue investigating the rich local biodiversity to learn about the natural and heritage resources of the municipality, and announced new teaching units to teachers that will be made available to them in order to work with this knowledge in schools.
The whales
Francisco Vera had planned to carry out a whale watching yesterday with Sergio Hanquet, but it was suspended when the act with the children was extended. The young man considers it a privilege to live and visit the Canary Islands and, specifically, a place like the south of Tenerife, where cetaceans play a fundamental role in the marine ecosystem and the elimination of carbon dioxide, a key factor in the fight against the climate change. Vera Manzanares, who recognized that mobile phone use should be detached a bit, invited not to focus so much on technology and “get closer to the sea, enjoy the snow on Mount Teide, listen to seabirds and get to know nature first-hand.”
