A few months back my family and I volunteered to clean up our neighbourhood and pick up litter. My area looks tidy, yet we were all shocked to see how much litter we picked in a short time. We have started cultivating awareness about our waste and its impact on the environment. The litter picking experience has opened a whole new dialogue in our home about the impact of littering and our role in taking care of our surroundings. I made some research on how to have an active role into keeping our towns clean. This is how I found out that City of Helsinki has a successful volunteering programme called Park Pals.

Park Pals is a programme organised by the City of Helsinki’s Urban Environment Division in which volunteers help look after Helsinki’s parks and other green areas which include its parks, forests, meadows, shorelines, streets and paths. Any local resident who wants to work as a volunteer in Helsinki’s public green areas can become a Park Pal. Espoo and Vantaa residents are welcome to help too! Associations, daycare centres, schools, companies and other organisations can also form Park Pals groups. There is no age limit to be a Park Pal: it is an activity suitable for families and children too. Local families use this activity to teach children the value of community work and to take care of shared green areas.

Park Pals may freely choose their working hours according to their own abilities and schedules. In principle, Park Pals should volunteer their time on a somewhat regular basis and more than just once a year. To give you a figure, on an average a Park Pal works 50 hours per year.

Jobs vary based on skill and interest: the volunteer coordinator helps assign volunteers to things to do. The main task is picking litter, but it’s possible to help in other ways. Tasks can include shovelling snow, raking, weeding, helping at events, planting flowers, trimming, and so on. If you have gardening skills, you are encouraged to inform the volunteer coordinator. Equipment such as litter pickers are provided by City of Helsinki.

Every year, Helsinki Park Pals collect thousands of bags of litter and collectively volunteer for over 10 000 hours. Their contribution has a big impact and helps City of Helsinki to cut otherwise high cleaning costs.

If you are looking for a way to make an impact in taking care of your own city, sign up! To become a Park Pal, sign up at the customer service point of Helsinki City Urban Environment Division. More information on Park Pals can be found on this page.

Espoo and Vantaa residents can participate to Park Pals. However, if they wish to help closer to where they live, City of Espoo has a similar initiative called Our Park. City of Espoo also organises “cleaning efforts” twice a year. City of Vantaa has volunteering opportunities to keep the town clean.

As a parent I find it important to involve children in volunteering activities to teach them to care about their community. Park Pals and similar programmes offer a great opportunity to show children how to take concrete action to defend nature. Involve your family, friends, colleagues, and sign up: let’s help keep our towns clean and our green areas tidy!

Big thanks to Park Pals volunteer coordinator Armi Koskela for answering my questions to allow me to write this post!

Image by Mabel Amber, who will one day from Pixabay