The students selected were Lester Louis Lopez of UP Los Baños, Alita Criselle Bautista of Ateneo de Manila University, Ryan Anthony Buccat of Lorma Colleges, Jeffrey Mora of Far Eastern University and John Rex Jardinero of Palawan State University.
The five winners will be joining their student counterparts from Thailand, India, Singapore, China, Indonesia, Korea, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Poland for a field trip to Germany to observe environmentally sound practices in a highly developed country like Germany.
Three students were also selected to represent the Philippines in the inaugural Eco-Minds Asia Pacific Youth Forum, slated this October. They are: Jordan Zamoranos of St. Louis University, Gerard Dumancas of University of the Philippines-Visayas and Tristan Kirby Nabongo of University of the Philippines-Cebu.
The three Eco-Minds Philippine representatives will be interacting with delegates from eight other Asia-Pacific countries namely: Australia, New Zealand, India, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, China and Korea.
The eight winners were chosen based on their presentations related to the UN Millennium Development Goals, which they expounded on before a distinguished panel of judges from the media, government, the United Nations, and youth and non-governmental organizations.
The Bayer Young Environmental Envoy Program seeks to educate the youth in the global efforts to save and protect the environment, and is a flagship initiative of Bayer and United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). Eco-Minds is a new program under the youth education partnership between Bayer and UNEP which challenges the youth to think of creative and practical uses of science and technology in an interdisciplinary way in order to address the challenge of Sustainable Development.