Tomorrow today; 2010 - unesdoc - Unesco

Image: UNEPGroup photograph of the first MESA Workshop participants. Front row centre: Mr. Achim Steiner, Executive Director, UNEP and the Hon. John Michuki, Kenya’sMinister for Environment and Mineral Resourcesactivities such as curriculum modifications to discipline-specificcurriculum changes.The third phase (2009-2011) aims at promoting the mainstreamingof environment and sustainability into teaching, learning andresearch and further into community outreach in at least 50 percent of African universities. It is a follow-up to the ITP and willupscale the successes of the training programme and promote thepositive lessons learned to at least 50 per cent of Africa’s universities.Phase three will also promote teaching and research in the six UNEPpriority themes of climate change, disasters and conflicts, ecosystemmanagement, environmental governance, harmful substances andhazardous waste, resource efficiency: sustainable consumption andproduction. This phase will also see the translation of the MESAESD toolkit into Portuguese and Arabic to reach out to Lusophoneand Arabic Africa, including capacity-building programmes forcourse design, use of ICTs and UNEP materials, and strengtheningthe MESA electronic networking forum to adopt a proactive,developmental approach to networking. Also, this phase will seethe establishment and formalization of a MESA focal point communicationssystem in all participating universities, using existinguniversity infrastructure and resources.Introducing GUPESFrom 2010 to 2011, MESA is being replicated at the global level underthe Global University Partnership on Environment and Sustainability(GUPES) partnership programme. The main aim of GUPES is similarto MESA in promoting the integration of environment and sustainabilityconcerns into teaching, research, community engagement andmanagement of universities. UNEP will also partner with GUPES toguide knowledge generation in its thematic areas.The initiative, in line with the Bali Strategic Plan, focuses on engagingwith universities to influence policy by competency buildingand technology support at the global, regional and national levels.Furthermore GUPES will contribute to the promotion of the environmentcomponent of the United Nations Decade of Education forSustainable Development (2005-2014) and the implementation ofthe Programme of Work 2010-11, which is replete withknowledge generation and capacity-building activities forUNEP’s key stakeholder groups.Outputs of GUPES in UNEP’s Programme of Work2010-2011 include:• Creating an expanded network of universities onNorth/South and South/South modalities thatintegrate ecosystem management systematically intoa wide range of disciplines, faculties, programmesand courses in universities, and focusing onintegration of these concerns into universitypolicies, management practices, communityengagement and student activities. The expandednetwork should be measured on quantity andquality of research and teaching• Establishing knowledge networks to inform andsupport key stakeholders in the reform ofpolicies and the implementation of programmes forrenewable energy, energy efficiency and reducedgreenhouse gas emissions• Ensuring that multi-disciplinary scientific networksare more strategically connected to policy makersand development practitioners, to integrateenvironment into development processes• Establishing national and regional information networksand demonstrating that they support regional-levelactions on chemical-related priority issues.UNEP and the Caribbean sub-region have launched asimilar programme, dubbed Mainstreaming Environmentand Sustainability in Caribbean Universities (MESCA)under the GUPES programme with The University ofWest Indies (UWI) in Jamaica as the focal point. The firstGUPES consultative meeting is planned for November2010 to bring together stakeholders in shaping the directionof the global programme.[ 128 ]