资源环境科技发展态势分析平台

Kitchen wraps made from banana leaves. Eyeglass frames forged from recycled plastic bottles. And a multi-purpose cleaner no bigger than a pill.

These ideas are the winners of a new competition from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) that’s designed to help counter some of the greatest environmental threats facing Latin America and the Caribbean.

The Innovation for Sustainable Lifestyles awards recognize young entrepreneurs whose concepts could help reduce pollution, combat climate change and prevent biodiversity loss.

This year’s contest included 76 teams from 12 Latin American countries. The winners were announced in September during the region’s Sustainable Consumption Week.

A small company from Bolivia that makes banana leaves to replace plastic kitchen films won first place. Second place went to a group of entrepreneurs crafting eyeglass frames from plastic bottles in Ecuador. And a team from Mexico that produces a biodegradable cleaner in pill form, negating the need for plastic containers, came in third place.

“What was once important, today is urgent. That is one of the lessons learned from the pandemic,” said Jacqueline Alvarez, UNEP Regional Director in Latin America and the Caribbean. “If we want lasting and long-term results, we must integrate environmental sustainability into all actions, and essentially into the COVID-19 recovery.”

The ceremony comes against the backdrop of what experts call a triple planetary crisis: rapidly intensifying climate change, unchecked pollution and the looming extinction of 1 million species.