Groups of volunteers have planned to carry out a large-scale activity to clean up beach areas and nearby sand dunes. The volunteers will be collecting trash and litter the whole day on Friday (tomorrow).
Doha Environmental Actions Project and Qatar Volunteers have joined hands with Qatar International Adventures (QIA) to raise awareness about the environmental damages wrought by litter.
Jeanne Bedard Brown has been in the forefront of the volunteer campaign to clean up beaches. The 30-year-old Canadian expatriate has been living with her husband in Qatar for a year. A dietician by profession, she formed the Qatar Environmental Actions Project to voluntarily clean up the beaches.
Community caught up with her to discern about her work and the event on Friday.


Please tell us briefly about yourself and your volunteer work.
I moved to Qatar a year ago with my husband, who, works in food safety field. My interest for environment comes from my job because I think you cannot have healthy food without having a healthy environment. When we came here, we started snorkelling. I would be at the beach or in the sea as much as I could. When I snorkel, I see more plastic than fish. For me, it’s a problem. I do not like fish consuming plastic. 
In May 2017, I started a Facebook group. I posted that while snorkelling, I will also be doing some beach cleaning. I started with two people and now I have 100 cleaning up the sea lines and inland sea. So far I have done 35 clean-ups. We have been to different places for cleanliness like public beaches, wild beaches, old fishing villages, and coastal sand dunes. I am new to Qatar and it has been a great way to discover the country, with a purpose. 
Many people make fun of me when they see me cleaning up the beaches. I do not care. My goal is not to make everyone clean up beaches. What I want is for people to stop littering beaches. I do fun and cleaning at the same time.
The Ministry of Environment has been doing a great job. They have put bins, garbage cans, and drums on beaches, but people do not usually use them. I do this work with a sense of community and relationship to Qatar. We work in a community having people from 25 different countries to clean up Qatar’s sea and beaches. When we are at the beaches, we also raise awareness among visitors about not to litter the place.


How have you planned the big clean-up on Friday?
The QIA has noticed our earlier work. They are very happy with us because our efforts not only support clean environment but also (help the cause of) tourism. We want to work together to promote eco-tourism and to enjoy Qatar’s natural beauty, with a purpose. 
We have planned a major clean-up and the QIA is going to support us with transport facilities for 100 volunteers and a dinner at one of their desert camps. It is also very valuable to take care of sand dunes that are Qatar’s national pride.
In the beginning, I did not believe that cleaning up the beaches would become an important thing or purpose for me.


What kind of trash do you find in the sea, on the beaches, and sand dunes?
Most of all, we find plastic. A plastic bottle can stay in the ocean, say for 400 years. We find a lot of plastic caps, plastic bottles, plastic bags, candy wrappers, and even batteries. We find many other things also.
We find litter everywhere. If the garbage is not thrown by the people, it is brought ashore by tides. The trash in an ocean does not need a passport. I am more concerned about small chunks of plastic because these are the first things that the fish or birds can eat. We can easily collect bigger objects, but the smaller ones are hard to get and collect.


Where and how do you dispose of the trash?
To the best of my capacity, I have been bringing all the trash back to my house and then giving it to a recycling company. Now, it is going big and my car is not too big. I have contacted the Ministry of Environment and a solid waste management company working in Qatar.
We now put the garbage in nearby bins. If we do not find a bin nearby, I will inform the ministry or the company and will provide them the location where the waste is.


How is the response of the people to your clean-up drive?
I think the people care. We have many people who have only Friday as their weekly off day. They will still come with me on a Friday and do the clean-up activity. There are different reasons; some of them are looking for a social activity; some people take it as a sport or a free gym; some of them do it to have contact with nature; some love animals and birds and they want to protect them. They also do it for better environment, for cleaner beaches and water. They love the country and they want to protect it. 
Further, different government departments have also been very appreciative of our work. For me, environment is everybody’s problem. We cannot accuse one or certain persons for this.
The ministry has been very helpful. They provide me with plastic bags when I run short of the bags. They also help us remove our bags from the beaches. They give me permission to go to places that are difficult to access. They also sometimes give us transport. They help us as much as they can.
I hate it when people say that there are paid people to clean the garbage. There are about 2.6 million people in Qatar, but there aren’t 2.6 million cleaners. One does not need to pick somebody else’s garbage. What I only ask the people is to put their garbage in nearby bins.


What are your future plans?
We are going to release a video covering our past activities on December 29. The video shows our work to clean up Qatar and improve the environment. Education is a big part of our activities. We need to stop people littering around.
In Canada, my love for nature came from woods and trees. When I came here, it was hard for me to relate to nature. However, it took me some time to learn about the desert. I have started loving the desert and beaches since. When you love something, you want to protect it.