Young ladies excited to have taken part in video for the UNCCD (+Video)

WITH THE AID of three little helpers, from the Calliaqua Anglican School, the Secretariat of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), will begin gathering and showing from today, International Women’s Day, submissions from women all over the world who are land ambassadors and heroes. The three young girls from the Calliaqua Anglican School, Sadie Dopwell, Romanah James and Tyianna Willians, have taken off with popularity after their video encouraging women to share their stories to https://www. womenandunccd.org/ garnered much appreciation on social media.

SEARCHLIGHT spoke with the three girls yesterday who said they were very excited to have participated in the promotional video that will allow for a showcase of women’s contributions to the successful implementation of the UN Convention thus far.

The girls’ call for content is for the project “LAND: Recognizing The Faces and Voices of Women; Celebrating Their Roles” and is designed to showcase women’s support of Sustainable Land Management( SLM). Dopwell, James and Willians, who are all 11 years old, were chosen by their teacher, Lydia Pope who has interfaced with the UNCCD in the past and to whom the UNCCD reached out for participation.

“These children are gonna grow up one day to be women. So if we start with them now it will expose them,” the teacher said in explaining why girls were thought of as the face of the promotional/introductory videos.

Pope and the students thought of the background and execution of the video themselves and completed the task in a day and a half with script help from the UNCCD.

Dopwell revealed that she had never had an opportunity to make something such as a video before, and it was fun to put it together with her friends.

She concluded that it was very important to think about the planet.

This is the first year that the young student has really reflected on the day, and her thoughts about being a female were concluded with the statement, “I think it’s good to be a girl. I don’t wanna be a boy.”

Williams said that it feels good to be a girl, and answered that the woman she looks up to is her mother who takes care of her.

“They say that they’re doing this for the women that take care of the earth and plant a lot to make food and my mom does that a lot. I actually look up to my mom and my grandma for that,” the young girl stated.

She wished St Vincent and the Grenadines a happy International Women’s Day.

On the other hand James confessed to being nervous about the video.

“I’d never done anything like this before but once I got to try it out I felt like it’s exciting to introduce every woman in the world and it just made me happy,” she said.

She too looks up to her mother who is the “best” and a great farmer.

The student believes that it is important to take care of the land.

“…When we take care of the land, when little plants grow up to adult plants they give us food and resources to live on this earth so plants are like, just living beings but they just live in the earth,” she reasoned.

She too wished a happy International Women’s Day “to all”.

As IWD is celebrated today, March 8, teacher Pope reflected that, “It’s always good to recognise women because prior to now, years ago, women always were in the back and in some countries women are still in the back. Women are not recognised although I think we do quite a lot… so it’s really good that you could have a day to recognise women.”

She continued, “And I’m really glad the UNCCD, this year, decided ‘listen we are going to recognise women who are working in the land because there are so many women who work in the land and they don’t get recognition. So we’re gonna recognise them and we’re gonna promote them’. I think that’s an excellent thing.”

Principal, Dr Corselle Smith said that the school is very proud.

She reasoned that it will not only help the students to get their image out there but they will realise its importance.

Smith said that whereas they may have overlooked in before, they “now will develop that kind of awareness that there is need for us to be a part and parcel and partner with other women around the world who are involved in ensuring that our world is a more secure place for our children.”

“But this is a very important project that the United Nations is undertaking, and I wish that more women, not only these children, I wish the day comes again when all schools would involve agricultural science as a practice back into the curriculum. I look forward to that day,” she also said.