Approximately one billion children—nearly half of the world’s children—live in “extremely high risk” countries for the impacts of climate change. Education provides the knowledge to mitigate these impacts and is one of the most potent and untapped drivers to ensure the transition to greener societies across the world. Without a quality education for every child, climate-related deaths will rise drastically, communities will fail to adapt, and climate targets will continue to evade us.
The our one-hour closed-door session reflected on Ireland’s efforts to date, as well as its potential for action and leadership on these dual agendas, in relation to Ireland’s International Development Policy, ‘A Better World’. The debate was timely, marking the midpoint between COP 28 and COP 29 and riding the wave of the groundbreaking declaration on the common agenda for education and climate change, launched with 40 founding member states at COP28. There is now keen anticipation for Ireland to sign this milestone declaration.
At a time where Ireland is taking forward its second domestic strategy on Education for Sustainable Development and the world is facing huge global challenges this is a prime time for Ireland to take global leadership on this front.
We had a wonderful turnout from high-level actors across government, academia, unions, NGO’s, mulilaterials and more. The conversation stimulated a vital debate on the connections between the two issues, with a focus on the mitigation potential brought about by a quality, inclusive education for all.
We hope this will be the beginning of a deeper exploration of how to leverage the role of learning, and the importance of education financing if we’re to unlock it’s potential for transformative, long-term change.
