Nkabom involves delegates travelling from almost every corner of the world and we all know that flying is bad for our planet. But that doesn't mean that we haven't carefully considered the environmental impact of our programme and done all we can to minimise its footprint.
The Nkabom Steering Committee have taken inspiration from some of Rwanda's pioneering green initiatives and developed a Sustainability Action Plan for Nkabom 2010.
What does that mean you might ask. Well, sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present (making Nkabom a success) without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Nkabom also recognises the important role environmental co-operation has to play in peace building. Environmental issues and mutual ecological dependence across diverse communities, facilitates and encourages cooperation, cooperation that often is a first step toward the initiation of an ongoing dialogue, which would be difficult to mediate through political channels.
In light of this, our 
Sustainability Action Plan 
integrates the economic, social and environmental issues (including biodiversity) associated with the programme, so as to reduce our footprint.
The plan is split over four main areas:
- Waste and Resource Management
- Water usage
- Travel
- Energy
Each area has specific actions ranging from recycling all materials used in planning Nkabom, to offsetting the carbon output of the flights of the participants.
Keep checking the blog to see how the plan is progressing, and if you have any suggestions on how we can reduce the environmental impact of Nkabom further, please email us at nkabom@thercs.org 
.