Ryan Ba­choo

Lead Ed­i­tor–News­gath­er­ing

ryan.ba­choo@cnc3.co.tt

Re­bec­ca Bap­tiste is not your typ­i­cal mod­el. While many in the fash­ion world speak about the im­por­tance of pro­tect­ing the en­vi­ron­ment, Bap­tiste has gone a step fur­ther—wear­ing the crown of Miss En­vi­ron­ment T&T 2025, the very first ti­tle­hold­er in the coun­try.

The Miss En­vi­ron­ment pageant may be new to lo­cal au­di­ences, but its mis­sion is clear. When Rishikush Mi­ra­jkah, pres­i­dent of Miss En­vi­ron­ment In­ter­na­tion­al, in­vit­ed De­lano Manganoo to lead the T&T fran­chise, he ac­cept­ed af­ter rec­og­niz­ing the com­pe­ti­tion’s unique fo­cus on en­vi­ron­men­tal projects and women’s em­pow­er­ment.

For Bap­tiste, en­ter­ing the pageant was about much more than a sash and a crown.

“This plat­form has giv­en me the op­por­tu­ni­ty to raise aware­ness about en­vi­ron­men­tal is­sues and, more im­por­tant­ly, to in­spire oth­ers to take ac­tion to­wards a green­er fu­ture,” she told WE Mag­a­zine in a re­cent in­ter­view.

At 24, Bap­tiste has fused her mod­el­ing ca­reer with en­vi­ron­men­tal ac­tivism. Us­ing the reach of her so­cial me­dia plat­forms, she pro­motes aware­ness of en­vi­ron­men­tal prob­lems while high­light­ing so­lu­tions. She has part­nered with groups such as the Save Soil Move­ment and Tropi-Mulch, tak­ing her ad­vo­ca­cy di­rect­ly in­to schools.

“With Save Soil, I’ve been able to ed­u­cate stu­dents about soil degra­da­tion,” she ex­plained. “Through Tropi-Mulch, I’ve helped cre­ate green spaces with­in schools, al­low­ing stu­dents to con­nect with na­ture in a mean­ing­ful and ac­ces­si­ble way.”

Her al­ma mater, St Fran­cois Girls’ Col­lege, has seen her pas­sion first­hand. Be­yond schools, Bap­tiste has ex­tend­ed her out­reach to com­mu­ni­ties across T&T.

“My hands-on work with lo­cal or­gan­i­sa­tions has al­lowed me to con­nect di­rect­ly with young peo­ple. I al­so at­tend com­mu­ni­ty events where I net­work with fel­low ad­vo­cates and share knowl­edge. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, I use my on­line pres­ence to en­cour­age ac­tion among my fol­low­ers.”

As ex­treme weath­er events grow more fre­quent, Bap­tiste is keen­ly aware of the ur­gency of her work.

“What I’ve learned most since be­ing crowned Miss En­vi­ron­ment T&T is that no en­vi­ron­men­tal cause stands alone—they are all in­ter­con­nect­ed. We can’t com­bat cli­mate change while ig­nor­ing every­day ac­tions like lit­ter­ing. Re­al change be­gins with small, con­sis­tent ef­forts, be­cause every ac­tion plays a part in the big­ger pic­ture.”

Still, chal­lenges re­main. Se­cur­ing fund­ing and in­sti­tu­tion­al sup­port hasn’t been easy.

“Gain­ing sup­port from busi­ness­es and in­sti­tu­tions has been a chal­lenge. This has made it hard­er to ful­ly show­case the work my team and I are do­ing to pro­mote sus­tain­abil­i­ty and dri­ve pos­i­tive change,” she ad­mit­ted.

Nev­er­the­less, she press­es on, lever­ag­ing com­mu­ni­ty part­ner­ships, so­cial me­dia, and grass­roots events.

“I’m ex­cit­ed for what’s ahead and open­ly wel­come oth­ers to sup­port and be part of this jour­ney,” she said with de­ter­mi­na­tion.

Ed­u­cat­ing for the fu­ture

Bap­tiste be­lieves that for coun­tries like T&T, en­vi­ron­men­tal ed­u­ca­tion must be wo­ven in­to every­day life.

“It is es­sen­tial that we in­cor­po­rate cli­mate change ed­u­ca­tion in­to our schools’ cur­ric­u­la, pro­mote hands-on learn­ing, and col­lab­o­rate with com­mu­ni­ty groups. When gov­ern­ment, NGOs and cit­i­zens work to­geth­er, we can build a well-in­formed so­ci­ety ca­pa­ble of adapt­ing to these chal­lenges.”

But she stress­es that in­di­vid­u­als, not just in­sti­tu­tions, must take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

“Ed­u­cat­ing our­selves is the first step. By be­com­ing more in­formed, we can make bet­ter choic­es—us­ing eco-friend­ly prod­ucts, sup­port­ing lo­cal farm­ers, and en­gag­ing with lo­cal or­gan­i­sa­tions.”

Bal­anc­ing her mod­el­ing ca­reer with her en­vi­ron­men­tal ad­vo­ca­cy can be de­mand­ing, but Bap­tiste cred­its her sup­port sys­tem. She thanks na­tion­al di­rec­tor De­lano Manganoo and the EVP Pageants team for help­ing her main­tain bal­ance as both a mod­el and an am­bas­sador.

As the first Miss En­vi­ron­ment T&T, Bap­tiste knows she is lay­ing the ground­work for those who will fol­low.

“I want peo­ple, es­pe­cial­ly young women, to see that change is pos­si­ble. I went from sit­ting on the side­lines to stand­ing on the front­lines, ac­tive­ly work­ing to­wards a green­er, more sus­tain­able fu­ture. It’s nev­er too late—or too ear­ly—to make a dif­fer­ence.”

Guid­ed by the words of con­ser­va­tion­ist Robert Swan—“The great­est threat to our plan­et is the be­lief that some­one else will save it”—Bap­tiste is de­ter­mined to do her part. And with her crown as both sym­bol and plat­form, she is build­ing an army of eco-war­riors to join her in the fight for a green­er to­mor­row.