Conservation Matters: Award-Winning Work in the Credit River Watershed

A new six-part weekly series highlighting the Conservation Award recipients.

Part One: Youth Achievement Award Winners

A new year is a time to set new goals and refresh our mission to lead critical conservation work that supports a healthy environment that protects, connects and sustains us. It’s also a good time to reflect on the tremendous amount of work completed in 2023 by partners, businesses and individuals across the Credit River Watershed.

In June, we hosted the annual Friends of the Credit event in partnership with the Credit Valley Conservation Foundation, where we celebrated local environmental champions. The awards were issued across eight categories to pay tribute to the incredible work happening across the watershed by dedicated youth, volunteers, landowners, businesses, municipalities and partner organizations.

In recognition of the vital environmental work taking place in the Credit River Watershed, we’re kicking off a six-week series titled: "Conservation Matters: Award-Winning Work in the Credit River Watershed." This weekly series highlights the recipients honoured across the various award categories.

This week we’re highlighting our Youth Achievement Award recipients, awarded to those who are under 29 years old and strive to be future environmental champions by taking action to protect nature.

Our first recipients were volunteers in Credit Valley Conservation’s (CVC) Frontline Program for leadership through peer-to-peer environmental outreach and stewardship. Youth contributed 605 hours of community involvement volunteer hours in 2022.

Two notable projects from last year included:

• The Youth Water Advocate initiative: educating and engaging more than 500 students about the value of water as a critical resource.
• The cross-cultural exchange with the Garvagh Forest Youth Club based in Northern Ireland.

The unique exchange allowed students to live-stream an event to educate their peers on wildlife and climate change issues in their respective regions and to do a virtual nature walk. The exchange connected like-minded youth separated by an ocean and resulted in some students becoming pen pals, building off their shared passion for the environment.

Jasmine Ma and Mokshita Hurday completed over 100 hours of service in 2022 and accepted the award on behalf of the program.

Our second Youth Achievement Award was issued to Mississauga Youth (MY) Seed Library for their commitment to tackle food insecurity and climate change for Mississauga’s Climate Change Youth Challenge. The youth-lead program connects people to locally grown seeds and provides education on growing food and biodiversity.

The program has been operating since March 2021. Through education and providing seeds to the community, MY Seed Library is helping the community connect with where food comes from and provides a barrier-free way for Mississauga and Peel residents to learn about what plants thrive in our local ecosystem and have access to healthy food.

Marynil Munoz, Teresa Nguyen, Saniya Gunputh and Olivia Li accepted the award on behalf of MY Seed Library.

Stay tuned for next week when we highlight our Outstanding Volunteer Award winners. To learn more about Our Conservation Awards program or to nominate someone for this year’s awards, visit cvc.ca/conservationawards.