Egypt took part in the Earth Hour campaign on Saturday by turning off lights from 8:30pm to 9:30pm.
The event was marked by millions of people in around 5,000 cities in 135 countries.
Environment Minister Laila Iskandar said the main goal of switching the lights off is not only rationalizing consumption for one hour, but also uniting people everywhere for the mission of protecting the planet, so every individual would be part of the campaign.
The campaign was organized by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). It’s slogan is “Use your energy to make change reality.” It targets saving energy, raising awareness of global warming, positive engagement within environment protection through turning off lights and non-essential electronics for an hour.
Lights were turned off at pivotal tourist and cultural venues in Egypt like the Pyramids, the Sphinx, Salah Eddin Citadel, Cairo Tower as well as several hotels and other tourist places, which indicates cooperation between each of ministries of culture, tourism and governorates of Cairo and Giza.
Iskandar called on companies and individuals to take part within events of the campaign through switching off unnecessary lights or reducing consumption during the hour or replacing it with candles, as a positive participation to limit climate changes and global warming.
The campaign was first launched in 2007 in Sydney, where restaurants replaced lights with candles. Lights were switched off in houses and buildings including the Sydney Opera House.
As 2.2 million residents of Sydney took part within the initiative, 400 cities then joined the Earth Hour campaign in 2008 including Atlanta, San Francisco, Bangkok, Ottawa, Dublin, Vancouver, Montreal, Phoenix, Copenhagen, Manila, Chicago, Toronto, Melbourne and others.
Dubai was the first Arab city to take part in the campaign.
