INTRODUCTION & PROGRAMME - APCEIU

184th Asia-Pacific Teachers Training WorkshopWhat is Sustainability?• Sustainability is an evolving concept• Issues underlying sustainability are complex and cannot be encapsulated within the diplomaticlanguage of its definition.• Existence of too many definitions has resulted in some cases of ‘paralysis by analysis’ and indelays in key changes essential for a more sustainable society.Change Towards SustainabilityQ. What changes are necessary to achieve sustainability?• Sustainability is more about new ways of thinking, than about science or ecology.• Whilst it involves the natural sciences and economics, it is primarily a matter of culture.• It is concerned with the values that people cherish and the way we perceive our relationshipswith the natural world.(Adapted from UNESCO 2002 From Rio to J’Burg)Change Towards SustainabilityQ. What changes are necessary to achieve sustainability?• Major environmental problems cannot be solved from a narrow Scientific perspective• We need fundamental shifts in the way we interpret the role of science, politics and educationof sustainability.• We require stronger links between environmental issues, social and economic context inwhich we live.(Adapted from UN 1992 Agenda 21)Overview of EfS‘Matters of environmental quality and human development are central to education forsustainability. It is based on the premise that we cannot have environmental quality without humanequality’(Agyleman l999 p.3)Rio Earth Summit 1992Resulting Document:• Agenda 21• The Rio Declaration on Environment and Development• The Statement of Forest Principles