The stunt is a bid to make a Guinness World Record for “The World’s Longest Toilet Queue“.

The event which will take place on 22 March marks the UN World Water Day and will see countries from America to Zimbabwe stand in solidarity with the 2.6 billion people worldwide who do not have access to a safe and dignified toilet.

The World’s Longest Toilet Queue will see a number of different groups of people from around the world queuing for atleast ten minutes outside of a toilet – whether it be real or fake and the Birmingham queue is scheduled to take place at Victoria Square.

The lack of access to clean water and basic sanitation is a crisis that kills 4,000 children every day worldwide.

Celebrities are also getting involved with the event including award winning actress Jharana Thapa who plans on joining the queue in Nepal.

Ceridwen Johnson the Communications Manager at Freshwater Action Network says:

“The World’s Longest Toilet Queue is a great opportunity, not only to raise awareness, but to express solidarity with people around the world that are committed to this issue.

We’re excited about how many people are organising themselves and mobilising others to take part in this record breaing visual demonstration of global outrage at the sanitiation crisis.”

The global campaign event is organised by End Water Poverty, the Freshwater Action Network and Sanitation Collaborative Council. More information on the Guinness World Record attempt can be found here or come to the event on Monday, March 22 at midday at Victoria Square.

The event took place at The University of Birmingham and aimed to raise awareness of the impact of climate change in Pakistan by providing an insight into the first hand experiences of a charity worker.

Shakar has been working with Oxfam for 2 years at the Pakistan office based in Islamabad and currently specialises in Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate change.

Shakar’s role as a Programme Officer involves helping to build communities’ capacity to mitigate and address future impacts of climate change. Shakar also explained the importance of strengthening communities’ own coping mechanism against disasters.

He expressed particular concern that the impact of climate change in Pakistan is not widely known in Pakistani communities living outside of their country of origin, saying:

‘I would like the people of Birmingham to know that their contribution can and will go a long way to improving the lives of people in poor countries. Their continued support and care will ultimately bring positive results.’

If you were unable to attend the event but still wish to hear more, Arbab Shakar is participating in a climate change debate on 18 March at 1pm which is being broadcast live here.

The project, commissioned by Recycle Now, aims to raise awareness about recycling and to combat the common opinion that only some household items can be recycled.

All of the items used by Murdoch are waste materials that have been recycled in the local area, including fridges, televisions and microwaves.

The sculpture is to be unveiled this week and is part of a campaign featuring art pieces based on iconic places in the UK; other towns participating include London, Southampton, Bristol and Plymouth.

Murdoch says:

‘It’s been quite complex thinking about how we can take these things apart and use them as part of a sculpture, but also to show where they have originally come from.

It’s been very fun but it’s also been a head-scratcher.’

Other work by Murdoch can be found on his website.

Birmingham based company Globally Local hosted a Green Dragon’s Den event last week as part of  the city’s line up for the “Fairtrade Fortnight”.

The panel included Jeremy Piercy, the founder and MD of Shared Earth; Rianne Ten Veen, the founder of Green Creation and Professor Rex Harris, a professor for the University of Birmingham and the inventor of hydrogen as fuel.

A Simple Cure For The Plastic Bag Plague

The event’s organiser, Malcolm Currie, was the first person to slay the Dragons with his “Turtle Bag” concept.

Currie’s animated presentation explained to the young crowd the dangers that plastic bags have to the environment – specifically the threat to turtles in Sri Lanka. The audience were particularly responsive to an image of a turtle trapped inside a plastic bag, many of the children raised there hands to ask what they could do to prevent this.

Currie then presented the eco-friendly product which is made using natural fibres and offers an environmentally friendly alternative to plastic bags.

He went on to explain that one of the main reasons that people use plastic bags is because they do not always know when they are going shopping, so they often do not have a sustainable alternative method to hand; the innovative design of The Turtle Bag combats this problem because it can be folded up into a small ball and is easily transportable.

The bags themselves are made in Sri Lanka using sustainable material and cost £3. The concept received unanimous praise from the panel.

Rianne Ten Veen joked: “How on Earth did we manage to survive as a species without plastic bags?  We use 13 billion plastic bags a year. We don’t need to, not with products like the Turtle Bag. Very well done.”

Revolver Records Release Eco T-shirt Range

The second person to face the dragons was Paul Birch, the managing director of Revolver Records and founder of Revolver Worlds, a company that specialises in Fairtrade t-shirts. Birch used the companies slogan, “…where clothing doesn’t have to cost the earth” to sum up the product; a sustainable and eco-friendly range of t-shirts that is also cheap to buy.

Birch also compared his product to the Fairtrade t-shirts manufactured by Marks & Spencers and revealed that their products are not 100% fair trade, as it is only the cotton that is fairtrade and not the production method. He also stated that because Revolver Records market their t-shirts through the Co-op, they are sold in recyclable boxes which cuts down on production time and explains why the price is so low.

The t-shirts come in a range of different sizes and designs, and are available at £5 each. Birch received praise from the panel for keeping every aspect of the production line ethical and eco-friendly, and at a low and affordable price.

You’re Never Too Young To Recycle Your City

Mauth Aldabbagh was the final person to present to the Dragons (and he was also at the Extra Green Drinks later in the evening). The teenager from Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, told the audience his inspiring story of how he introduced recycling into the town.

Aldabbagh revealed that when a friend of his discovered that there wasn’t any facilities to recycle waste, they formed a group on Facebook in March 2008 to raise the issue to others.

The campaign soon built up strength and is now a multi-million pound organisation called Recycle Your City. The campaign aims to solve urban solid waste management problems by promoting recycling as an alternative to dumping.

Jeremy Piercy said:

“It’s stories like that that are truly inspiring. It is so very important for young people to get involved with environmental issues because they are the future. I think today has proved that.”