IN this week's Advertiser we reported on Kilcreggan Primary receiving a gold award from the Woodland Trust for its pupils’ ‘green’ activities.

Kilcreggan isn’t alone, of course. In the course of the last 12 months, we’ve also reported on the Eco Schools ‘Green Flag’ achievements of pupils at Cardross, Rhu, Luss and Rosneath – and we know that environmental awareness is now a central part of the curriculum at every school.

The way we are all living our lives at the moment means that primary school pupils aren’t the only ones contributing to the wellbeing of our planet. All around the world there are stories, and vivid satellite images, laying out how much of a positive effect coronavirus lockdowns are having on air pollution in our cities – and lots of speculation of whether there will be a longer term benefit to the environment once lockdown limits are lifted.

READ MORE: Kilcreggan pupils strike gold with Woodland Trust award

I’d like that to come true, but I hae ma doots. We humans are only rational up to a point, and having been told for such a long time that we must not do a thing, it’s only natural that, the very moment restrictions are lifted, we’ll want to do that thing to the full.

And while the environment may be benefitting from the lockdown, the world’s economies certainly aren’t – so it’s hard to imagine that the opportunity to start up the factories which belch endless tonnes of harmful gases into the atmosphere won’t be seized with just as much enthusiasm.

But if, when the moment the last lockdown limit is lifted, we all just lapse into behaving exactly the way we did before anyone outside of a lab had even heard the word ‘coronavirus’, it won’t be long before the next pandemic comes along. And if that fear drives us to behave a little bit more like the pupils from Kilcreggan, and from Rosneath, Rhu, Cardross, Luss and elsewhere, and make our planet a safer place to live, you won’t get any complaints out of me.

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