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Where: Room D12, 9/F Camelpaint Industrial Building (Block 2), Kwun Tong

What: Established in 2002 by a group of university students, Footprint is a local organisation dedicated to educating the public on environmental issues.

Its name comes from the academic term 'ecological footprint' - an indicator of how many hectares of land is required to support each resident of an area, based on their consumption of  resources such as grain, wood and water.

Every Hong Kong resident requires an average of about 6.1 hectares, but global resources can only provide each person with 1.7 hectares.

Thus, the Earth needs to be at least 3.6 times more resourceful in order to accommodate our needs, if people worldwide consumed at the same rate as Hong Kong citizens.

How: Visit www.footprint.org.hk or call 3529 1357. Footprint organises a wide variety of environment-related activities that require volunteer help.

University students can serve as eco-tour guides after training.

Volunteer: Mandy Wong Chuk-kwan, 21, is a biology student at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She joined the team of eco-tour guides last year before being appointed executive officer of Footprint's environmental education department.

Wong's unit is responsible for projects such as No Air-Con Day  and ecological training at youth centres.

'I enjoy hiking and have learned a lot about nature, plants and animals during my training as an eco-tour guide.

The guides lead a small group of people  and teach them about the nature  in an area. The tour is conducted so as to have a minimal impact on natural surroundings and monuments.

I've led students, children and their parents on tours around the countryside.

I don't expect people to remember all the information I've taught them. But if they learn something from the trip and realise that Hong Kong's nature is very interesting - and start to protect it - I am happy.

People sometimes step on grass unintentionally. If more people keep doing so, grass will be unable to grow there again, as muddy grounds will be crushed and become solid. This happens very often, especially in areas around barbecue pits in country parks.

Some people even bring plastic bags to collect interesting rocks and shells from beaches. This destroys the habitat of the creatures that live there.

The world's environment is deteriorating and more severe natural disasters are happening.

I hope people will care more about the environment   because Earth is our home.'



Footprint