SEVERAL Scouting-oriented social media groups have pledged support for the “Promise to the Planet Campaign” of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines in support of the UN-initiated environment project.
The campaign was introduced by the World Organization of the Scout Movement to involve Scouts worldwide to conduct several community services in the run for the COP26 (Conference of the Parties), a gathering of countries who have signed up to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change held in Paris in 1992.
The conference aims to maintain a below 2°C temperature in the planet’s atmosphere as climate scientists have warned that temperatures higher than 2°C would be dangerous to life on earth.
The groups are the Amateur Media Association of Philippine Scouts with its nationwide membership headed by its President Scout Win Sharm M. Cinco; Scouts Tambayan represented by Scout Dwen G. Bayon-on from Visayas; Luzon-based Scouting Memories administered by Scout John Colico; BSP Brotherhood managed by Scout Jonathan Magallanes from Luzon; and Scouting Diaries headed by Scout Leader Harold Patuasic, who is based in Mindanao.
Scout Bayon-on, said they would help spread any BSP news and initiatives about the Promise to the Planet using their own social media pages with more than 100,000 total followers and made sure that it would reach its intended target.
In September, the BSP National Office issued a memorandum encouraging local councils all over the country to conduct pro-environment activities like tree planting, recycling, urban gardening and post them on social media to create an impact that will inspire other Scouts and the citizenry to do the same. In the same month, the BSP issued another memorandum bearing the Promise to the Planet Manifesto which carries a 10-point promise which the Scouts would sign online to signify their pledge to the environment.
Using change.org – a petition website – the BSP would gather signatures and pledges in support of the project. The portal can be accessed through the link of the petition and all participants shall receive a Promise to Planet Manifesto signed with their name via email within five days. The petitioners shall post the manifesto on their social media with the hashtag #PromiseToPlanet #ScoutsPH and encourage their friends and families to do the same. Likewise, an update will be posted on our social media upon reaching certain milestones from the first 100 signatures, 1000, 5000, and so on.
The BSP also launched a Page bearing the campaign name, a social media engagement platform where Scouts can share environment-related activities and participation efforts. It would also be a venue where Scouts can express thoughts, ideas, or views about the significance of taking part in the preservation of the planet and the BSP’s response to the World Organization of the Scout Movement’s initiative to rally the Scouting Movement to the Promise to the Planet initiative.
“We have been conducting pro-environment activities before and aligning these to the Promise to the Planet Campaign, would give more meaning to what we have been doing for the environment,” said Cinco of AMAPS, one of the groups who have been spreading environment posts of the BSP online to reach wider targets.
