MANILA (Eagle News Service) – To promote ASEAN cooperation in the field of the environment, different working groups consisting of representatives from ASEAN member states convene annually to discuss the steps made by each country for a cleaner and greener region.
The ASEAN had developed and implemented the ASEAN Environmental Education Action Plan, which helps the citizens through formal and non-formal education to participate and become active players in the development of ecologically sustainable societies.
Brunei Darussalam chairs this year’s ASEAN Working Group on Environmental Education (AWGEE) held in Manila. According to Chairperson Martinah Binti Haji Tamit, this working group is based on the ASEAN Environmental Action Plan 2014-2018, which identifies nine projects that would be led by all member states and assesses the progress of the activities of the ASEAN Environment Education’s five-year action plan from time to time.
In the Philippines, the National Education and Awareness Act of 2008 was beneficial to the promotion of Environmental Education through an inter-agency and multi-sectoral approach, with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) cooperating with other government units: Department of Education (DepEd), Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), Commission on Higher Education (CHED), as well as the private sector and NGOs.
ASEAN Working Group Vice Chairperson and DENR ASec. Corazon Davis said that “This ASEAN Action Group is actually trying to promote what each country has done so that we exchange and that we learn from each other.” She added that, “One of the programs that the ASEAN has agreed to implement is the search for Eco-Schools in the Elementary, Secondary and Tertiary [levels] primarily because we would like to transform the Filipino. In the Elementary [level], he should be “Environmentally Aware”, for Secondary or High School, he should become “An Environmental Citizen” and if he’s in College, he should become “An Environmental Professional.”
Every two years, the ASEAN members state award their respective Eco-Schools–a program common to all ASEAN countries. The award is determined by a point system that identifies if the environmental education policies are in place in the school’s curriculum, if there are mechanisms which could implement these programs and if these programs highlight clean air, clean water, effective waste management, biodiversity conservation and the like.
The participants of the 7th AWGEE hope that sharing their experiences with each member state would have a snowball effect which in turn would scale up or enhance the environmental education models in each country not only for enhanced cooperation but to pave the way for a more sustainable and greener ASEAN region. (Eagle News Service)