19 September 1995

Doc. 7391

COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMITTEE OF MINISTERS

Reply to Recommendation 1258 (1995)

on an action programme for

environmental education in teacher training

(adopted by the Committee of Ministers on 11 September 1995

at the 543rd meeting of the Ministers' Deputies)

      The Committee of Ministers has studied Parliamentary Assembly Recommendation 1258 (1995) with interest and decided to draw it to the attention of the governments of member states.

      The Committee shares the Assembly's view as to the importance of environmental issues and the need for present and future citizens to be not only aware of these problems, but also trained to be active and responsible in this area, where both their daily habits and the underlying system of values are concerned.

      In practice, as the Assembly itself points out, these problem areas have been the subject of Council of Europe activities for several years. One of the very first committees of experts set up at the Council of Europe when it added the environment to its programme was the one responsible for "environmental education and training". What is more, numerous activities to raise awareness and colloquies and studies led in 1991 to the adoption of Recommendation No. R (91) 8 on the development of environmental education in school systems.

      In this context, the Committee of Ministers wishes to advise the Assembly that a good number of the in-service teacher training courses organised under the aegis of the Council for Cultural Co-operation (CDCC) are devoted to the environment, as evidenced by the seminars held since 1985 in Norway, Sweden, Germany, Belgium and Denmark.

      With more particular reference to the training of future farm managers, it may be added that Recommendation No. R (90) 17 of the Committee of Ministers emphasises the importance of both introducing to agricultural education at secondary level syllabuses intended to increase the ecological awareness of tomorrow's farmers and developing these syllabuses.

      In a more general context, the Education Committee's Project on "A Secondary Education for Europe" - one part of which concerns the introduction of a European dimension to curricula - does not ignore environmental issues. Two monographs have just been published on two particularly significant experiments, namely the "Ozone" and "Baltic Sea" projects conducted at the initiative of the Foundation for Environmental Education in Europe and the Unesco Finnish Commission respectively. A folder entitled "Environmental damage: air pollution" is in preparation for use by teachers.

      The environment has also been selected already as a major subject for inclusion among the themes to be worked on during the forthcoming Council of Europe project on "citizenship education", which aims to foster conscious and active citizenship.

      All these efforts follow the lines recommended by the Parliamentary Assembly; however, the introduction of an action programme as suggested by the Assembly would require financial and human resources which the Committee of Ministers is unable to make available in the present budgetary context.