Power of education emphasised in climate change fight
▶ Everyone must take responsibility for empowering children to preserve planet, says UAE minister
Climate change has no boundaries and education is a crucial way to reach every family and every house to tackle it, a UAE minister has said.
Amna Al Shamsi, Minister of Climate Change and Environment, said it was everyone’s responsibility to empower children and to educate others about what it takes to preserve the environment.
Speaking during a panel discussion at the 12th World Environmental Education Congress in Abu Dhabi yesterday, Ms Al Shamsi underlined the importance of education in driving substantive change.
“Education has that power,” Ms Al Shamsi said.
“And it has that connectivity. It reaches every house [and] every family.”
Ms Al Shamsi was appointed Climate Minister this month, taking over from Mariam Al Mheiri.
Ms Al Shamsi said an education perspective and an environment perspective simply go hand in hand.
“I still wear my education hat,” she said, referring to her previous role as assistant undersecretary of the care and capacity building sector at the Ministry of Education.
“For any leader, whether it is in the environmental sector or private sector or in civil society, we all have to wear those two hats – educators and environmentalists.”
Ms Al Shamsi pointed to how the UAE had introduced a green education strategy in the country’s schools that focused on knowledge, skills and values. She said it was important that climate issues were not seen as isolated from everyday life.
“If you instil it as part of their [pupils’] values it is going to live with them,” she said.
“And it is not going to be something that is fun and good to try … and then they will forget about it.
“They are going to become tomorrow’s leaders and tomorrow’s decision-makers.
“We always have to believe that action and change starts from education.”
The congress, which is being held for the first time in the Middle East under the theme “Connecting People, Creating Tomorrow”, aims to highlight how environmental education is crucial in shaping a greener future.
Ministers, officials, climate advocates, campaigners, youth champions and others from about 72 countries will meet in the capital over the week to understand how education can chart a path to preserving the world’s vital natural resources for future generations.
Plenary sessions, panel discussions and workshops will be held aimed at nurturing leadership. A youth conference runs in parallel to empower the environmental leaders of tomorrow.
In her opening speech yesterday, Dr Sheikha Al Dhaheri, Secretary General of the Environment Agency Abu Dhabi, which co-organised the event, said our generation was potentially the last that could address climate change.
“Our generation is perhaps the first to feel its full, unbridled force and, possibly, the last that can effectively address it,” Dr Al Dhaheri said.
She said biodiversity loss reduced the resilience of ecosystems that support us and pollution was a “silent killer”.
“The very by-products of our civilisation have become the toxins of our time,” she said.
But she pointed to the ban on single use plastic bags and soon to be launched waste management behavioural campaign as signs of hope.
“There lies a beacon of hope – us,” she said.
“Yes, each one of us holds a piece of the puzzle to a sustainable future.”
The conference also heard speeches from Sheikha Shamma bint Sultan, president and chief executive of the UAE Independent Climate Change Accelerators; Razan Al Mubarak, president of the International Union for Conservation of Nature; and Dr Sheikha Shamma bint Mohammed Al Nahyan, chairwoman of the board of directors of the Sheikh Mohammed bin Khalid Al Nahyan Cultural and Educational Institutions.
The event is taking place at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre until Friday.
Our generation is perhaps the first to feel its full, unbridled force and, possibly, the last that can effectively address it
DR SHEIKHA AL DHAHERI Environment Agency Abu Dhabi