“Reduce waste for cleanliness - Recycle waste for green” is the message of the campaign “Turn off the lights, Turn on ideas in 2024” which was officially launched on March 23 in Hanoi. The campaign aims to raise awareness among the community, especially young people, about waste classification and recycling.

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Coming to the program, participants will visit the "Green City" with booths such as: Green Library, Green Post Office, Recycling Workshop... to have a specific view of the classification and recycling stages, increasing the life cycle of waste.

Green Park is the first destination - where players must overcome the challenge "Ball in the right basket, trash in the right place". Each ball color represents a type of waste. Players need to put the ball in the right basket, symbolizing a successful waste classification. The game is simple, suitable for even young children, helping them learn how to classify waste from an early age.

Green Post Office is a place to collect waste such as old and damaged clothes, milk cartons, batteries, etc. to transport to the most effective treatment locations.

The next stop is the Green Shopping Center. With the motto “old for others, new for us”, this place will have a variety of recycled fashion items, serving as a bridge for items to reach those who really need them. This helps build sustainable shopping habits, minimizing the negative impacts of fast fashion on the environment.

The green recycling workshop is a place to promote creativity with many activities such as: making flowers from recycled jeans, playing jigsaw puzzles made from recycled milk cartons, recycled plastic...

Children play jigsaw puzzles and draw wood from recycled plastic. Plastic waste is collected, sorted and shredded. Then, specialized presses are used to create products ranging from coasters, key chains, children's toys... to colorful table tops, wall panels, floor panels...

Table top is made from recycled plastic.

Participants draw and cut flowers from recycled jeans.

The finished flowers will continue to be added to the vase.

In addition, the program also has a variety of booths displaying and introducing products such as handbags made from recycled nylon, scented candles, environmentally friendly essential oils, recycled wool...

Ms. Nguyen Thi Hai Yen, founder of the handbag brand made from recycled jeans Meo Tom Handmade, shared that Turn off the lights Turn on ideas is a good environmental program that attracts a large number of young people to participate. Through the experiential activities at the program, Ms. Yen hopes to send a message: Instead of throwing away old products into the environment, we can recycle them, giving them a new life cycle so that they continue to be meaningful products and reach those in need.

Ninh Tito (in blue shirt), owner of a Youtube channel with more than 851,000 followers with videos about food and life, said: before he had the habit of sorting trash, he always had to think, hesitate, and even be a bit lazy every time he put trash in the bin. However, when he trained himself to get into the habit, everything seemed to be pre-programmed. Plastic bags, milk cartons, organic waste... each type of trash goes into which bin becomes extremely simple. "Let's create a habit of sorting trash right now because just that simple action will make a huge contribution to the environment," Ninh Tito shared.

The representative of the program's organizing committee said: in previous years, Turn Off the Lights, Turn On Ideas chose small topics such as responsible energy consumption, sustainable fashion, etc. This year, the topic of garbage has a much broader scope to guide people to reduce garbage, how to classify and recycle garbage effectively. Through each year of organization, the coverage of the program has become larger and larger, demonstrated through interactions on media sites, social networks as well as the number of people coming to participate directly in the event. Many of you are participants who later become collaborators with Turn Off the Lights, Turn On Ideas in the following years. The organizing committee hopes that the program will be increasingly welcomed, contributing to the national goals of bringing regulations on waste classification at source, officially applied from December 31, 2024.