My name is John Benus, a Gringo in love with Mexico for many years and moved to Puerto Vallarta. I just completed a successful "Guerra Contra La Basura" or War Against Littering campaign in Talpa de Allende and have been asked by the Puerto Vallarta Tourism Office to continue doing it here.
My goal & mission is to create a cleaner & healthier environment in Puerto Vallarta for all residents, visitors & future generations.Theme of the Campaign is "Puerto Vallarta is your home, please keep it clean" The use of street cleaners every day is not solving the major issue of people repeatedly throwing their cups, wrappers, beer cans and bottles, etc. into our streets, vacant lots, rivers and steams. This custom is a habit that can be corrected through educating the young and old how to have more pride in their country and neighborhood. The origin of littering began thousands of years ago when our fore fathers only used containers of wood or clay. When these items broke or they no longer need them, they just threw these containers into the woods, backyard or stream. These discarded objects then became a natural part of the environment and were all biodegradable in a few years. That custom or habit has been passed down from generation to generation up until today. The difference is todays containers of aluminum, plastic, glass & foils take years to biodegrade back to nature. Glass for instance takes more then 4,000 years to biodegrade, plastic 500-1,000 years and aluminum 200-500 years. The philosophy of the War Against Littering is: It's the responsibility of everyone to keep our planet clean no matter where you live or what country your from. If we don't take care of the planet now, there will be more flooding, droughts, hurricanes , cyclones & epidemics and eventually all species including humans will become extinct.
The War Against Littering campaign has two major phases. The first is to show what a clean street, river or vacant lot looks like, using volunteers to collect the litter. The second is an ongoing educational program in all the private and public school systems plus public service announcements through the media explaining why and how to maintain a cleaner and healthier environment .This will include an Animated Video where the birds, fish, turtles and other animals will speak about how we are destroying & polluting their habitats and what we as humans can do to help provide a clean & more healthy environment for them and us. This is the only war where no one gets hurt and everybody wins. Join us!
If you'd like to be a part of this campaign as a sponsor or volunteer, please contact me