He no longer wanted to watch the river of his childhood literally go down the drain. So Lulzim Baumann decided to free the Ishmi of plastic, chemicals and heavy metals. He studied agro-environment and ecology at the Agricultural University of Tirana and environmental planning with main focus in Waste Management at the Technical University of Berlin. After completing his Master’s thesis and a feasibility study for his project, he returned to his home university as a diaspora expert for six months in 2020. Funded by the Migration & Diaspora Programme on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Baumann gave 14 lectures on waste and water management for a total of 100 students – applied to the Ishmi river basin.

Together with his students, he developed a manual to help communities identify and clean up waste hotspots. He reached more than 500,000 people in television interviews and launched a debate on environmental management on social media. With the foundation of the ENFORCE – Engineers for Cooperation and Environment – association, Baumann intends to advance his mission in future projects between Germany, Albania and Kosovo.