South Africa is currently the world's third most biodiverse country, with one of the highest concentrations of threatened biodiversity in the world. Emerging research reveals the increasing pressure on this biodiversity with many wild resources continuing to be utilised for livelihood purposes even within urban environments. The Rio conventions,…

The article discusses the internationalising of informal experiential learning as a pedagogical intervention for sustainable development education in the curriculum of built environment disciplines in the United States (US). A group of American students in the School of Planning, Design and Construction at Michigan State University participated in…

To address the important challenge of taking good care of India's environment, substantial, good quality information is crucial. Unfortunately, pertinent information is in very short supply. Much of the nationally collected information lacks quality and is incomplete. Modern science has demonstrated that good information flows from an open,…

Incidences of disaster and climate change impacts are rising globally. Disaster risk reduction and climate change education are two educational responses to present and anticipated increases in the severity and frequency of hazards. They share significant complementarities and potential synergies, the latter as yet largely unexploited. Three…

The Business and Society Research Cluster (BSRC) at the German University in Cairo, the El-Khazindar Business Research and Case Center at the American University in Cairo and Misr El-Kheir (MEK) Foundation, Egypt, hosted the region's first sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) case studies conference, entitled "Toward a…

In the international policy discourse on sustainable consumption and production, education is acknowledged to be a powerful tool in changing unsustainable patterns of consumption. Current educational policies and programmes have responded to the consumption challenge mainly by including and addressing consumption issues in formal tuition in…

Traditional communities remain a dominant feature in the Pacific and are key players in land and sea management. Fostering improved climate literacy is therefore essential to equip communities to respond to the current and future challenges posed by climate change in the region. Increased understanding and development of skills to respond to the…

The UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) will be co-organised in 2014 by UNESCO and the Government of Japan on the occasion of the end of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. It has the following objectives: (1) Celebrating a decade of action; (2) Reorienting education to build a better future…

In this dialogue between two friends and colleagues with different takes on education for sustainability, Canadian environmental education scholar Bob Jickling argues that education "for" any cause is not true education, which should strive to prepare minds to create new ideas, not follow a doctrine. Since we don't have solutions to…

This article highlights the role of sustainability appraisal for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). Traditional HEI appraisal systems lack a way to assess the integration of sustainability principles reflecting societal needs with the consequences of research, education and management of HEIs. Two appraisal systems are discussed. The Austrian…

Fostering a deep understanding of sustainability in students is critical in order to create a new generation of leaders. Universities have a significant role to play in this endeavour. Dalhousie University has recently developed the Environment, Sustainability and Society (ESS) program, which gives students the opportunity to study sustainability…

Youth unemployment is a huge challenge for sustainable development in our societies. Statistics offer an alarming picture of the involvement of youth in the labour markets on a global scale. Germany, due to a strong tradition in vocational education and training deeply rooted in its culture, has very low rates of youth unemployment. The so-called…

Despite increasing awareness and acceptance of sustainability, relatively little is known about the motivations, viewpoints and experiences of people who choose to lead extremely sustainable lives. Through in-depth interviews with seven sustainability leaders, residing in an ecovillage or traditional suburban community in south-east Queensland in…

In defining quality of higher education, competences achieved by graduates are interpreted as essential criteria. There are two political processes in education dealing, among other issues, with competence development: the Bologna Process in European Higher Education Area and a global process--the United Nations (UN) Decade (2005-2014) of…

The sustainable development arguments we practiced in 1992 are now well rehearsed and as poignant as they were 20 years ago. Evidence compiled in the lead up to the forthcoming Rio Summit suggests that as a global community we have not learned to change. The question then becomes: what, if anything, have we learnt from this experience?