Wave of Change is back for another year, and locals couldn’t be happier! Yep, it's just been announced that the team behind Wave of Change are working hard to have another successful clean-up period to help out the Maltese environment.

What is Wave of Change?

Wave of Change is a local organisation that was started by Maltese swimming and environmental enthusiasts Neil Agius, Gilbert Bartolo and Richard Zerafa. Their mission? “To empower everyone to be a hero in their everyday life” and to raise awareness about environmental issues that Malta is currently facing. “We’re empowering more people to come together to take action to reduce plastic waste and make waves in the amount of plastic that ends up polluting the Maltese Seas we love so much.”

This year’s challenge

This year, four crazy guys and one incredible woman will be swimming 35km around Gozo on 29^th June to support this initiative. I spoke to Neil Agius, one of the founders of Wave of Change, about this year’s challenge and everything they’ve got going on.

“Last year, nobody knew about Wave of Change, but once we got things running, we got very good feedback. And we still do so today!” says Neil. “Our aim is to challenge people to be aware of the environment, and it is organically happening much more than it was last year.”

Neil, together with Richard Zerafa, Andrew Azzopardi, Steven Grech and Hannah Cutajar will be swimming round Gozo later this month. But what does a tough feat like this entail? “Typically, we train four times a week at the national pool, swimming for one and a half to two hours at a time. We also train for six hours on Saturday and three on Sunday.” If this isn’t commitment, I don’t know what is! Neil tells me that while this swim is easier compared to last year’s 70km swim, it’s still a task, but they’re aiming to finish it together in under 11 hours.

So why Gozo? “Last year we swam around Malta, so this year we decided to change it up and do the same with Gozo, because after all, we are called the Maltese Islands, so we need to take care of the different islands as well.”

The Wave of Change initiative inspires people to take action, reduce the amount of plastic consumption and just be more attentive to each other and the environment around us. “If you’re sitting on a bench eating an ice-cream, don’t leave the cup there but dispose of it. It’s as simple as that,” Neil says.

We support you all the way, guys!