In this new year the Earth Charter International will be refocusing its program of work. While the Earth Charter document continues to be used and spread through the efforts of the many thousands of individuals and organizations around the world, the ECI Secretariat and Council will be undertaking a program of work predominantly focused on education for sustainable development.
ECI will also establish a new and smaller Council. The newly formed ECI Council will consist of five of the previous members and five new members. The following five existing Council members will form the core of the new Council: Mateo Castillo (Mexico), Alexander Likhotal, (Russia / Switzerland), Oscar Motomura (Brazil), Alide Roerink (The Netherlands), and Kartikeya Sarabhai (India).
Click here to learn more about them.
The Council decided that the main focus of ECI will be on the establishment of the new Earth Charter Center for Education for Sustainable Development. The new Council will be the governing board of ECI and both the new Center’s activities, as well as the continued activities of the Secretariat in its network management function of the global Earth Charter Initiative.
The new Center will focus its activities on coordinating the UNESCO Chair on Education for Sustainable Development with the Earth Charter. This project has been established to fulfill the overall goals of the United Nations Decade on Education for Sustainable Development (UNDESD), which is to integrate the values inherent in sustainable development into all aspects of learning to encourage changes in behavior that allow for a more sustainable and just society for all. The specific area of knowledge creation and actions of this UNESCO Chair is the intersection between sustainability-related knowledge, education, and a strong ethical framework.
The UNESCO Chair project, housed in ECI’s new, green-designed facility in Costa Rica is expected to become a locus for education for sustainable development and Earth Charter research and training and several programs will be launched in 2013. More information on programs can be found on the Earth Charter Center’s Web page.
You can also download the letter from the ECI co-chairs as a pdf to read the full text on the future directions for ECI.