Let us make peace with the ENVIRONMENT

Lionel Wijesiri

The struggle to save the global environment is in one way much more difficult than the struggle to vanquish Hitler, for this time the war is with ourselves. We are the enemy, just as we have only ourselves as allies. - Al Gore

The new Environment Minister Anura Priyadharshana Yapa recently said that his priority would be to educate the people to love and live with the environment without harming or polluting it. “People must learn to protect the environment as a habit. We can maintain a clean and unpolluted environment only through an attitudinal change in ourselves, he further added.

Minister Yapa is correct. Like most other developing countries, Sri Lanka is today facing environmental problems of enormous magnitude that adversely affect the lives of its people from all walks of life. Many of these problems have resulted due to a lack of understanding and concern about environmental and sustainable development issues. This has led, among other things, to over-exploitation of natural resources and badly planned development and industrial projects. These have intensified socio-economic problems as well as created large scale air, water and soil pollution.

There are big disparities in incomes and lifestyles of people in Sri Lanka. This means that a large percentage of the population lives in poverty, with few options to choose environmentally appropriate lifestyles. Others are in a position to make environmentally sensitive decisions but rarely do so, partly because of lack of awareness.

In order to ensure people make positive choices about the environmental impacts of their lifestyles, there is an urgent need to create mass scale awareness on environmental and development issues. If Sri Lanka’s environmental problems are to be effectively tackled, then it is critical to have an informed public that understands and supports environmental initiatives.

Education

But how do we get around this hurdle? I believe we have an urgent need for educational institutions to be more research-oriented and not mere centres of learning. The educational institutions must create awareness of environment conservation and hygiene among the students.

Education is critical for promoting sustainable development and improving the capacity of the people to address environment issues. Education is indispensable to changing people’s attitudes so that they have the capacity to assess and address their sustainable development concerns.

It is also critical for achieving environmental and ethical awareness, values and attitudes, skills and behaviour consistent with sustainable development and for effective public participation in decision-making.

To be effective, environment and development education should deal with the dynamics of both the physical, biological and socio-economic environment and human (which may include spiritual) development and also should be integrated in all disciplines.

If we do recognise that we have to develop, on a priority basis, a national environmental education program, first of all, we should set our goals right. I propose the following objectives: (a) To achieve environmental awareness in all sectors of society on a national-wide scale as soon as possible; (b) To strive to achieve the accessibility of environmental education linked to social education, from primary school age through adulthood to all groups of people; (c) To promote integration of environment concepts, including demography, in all educational programmes, in particular the analysis of the causes of major environment and development issues in a local context.

The program should draw on the best available scientific evidence and other appropriate sources of knowledge, and give special emphasis to the further training of decision makers at all levels.

Strategies

As the next step, the Government should strive to prepare strategies aimed at integrating environment and development as a cross-cutting issue into education at all levels within the next three years. This should be done in cooperation with all sectors of society. The strategies should set out policies and activities, and identify needs, cost and means for their implementation, evaluation and review.

A thorough review of curricula should be undertaken to ensure a multidisciplinary approach, with environment issues and their socio-cultural and demographic aspects and linkages. Due respect should be given to community-defined needs and diverse knowledge systems, including science, cultural and social sensitivities.

Relevant authorities should ensure that every school is assisted in designing environmental activity work plans, with the participation of students and staff. Schools should involve schoolchildren in local and regional studies on environmental health, including safe drinking water, sanitation and food and ecosystems and in relevant activities, linking these studies with services and research in national parks, wildlife reserves, ecological heritage sites etc.; Educational authorities, with appropriate assistance of non-governmental organizations, including women’s and indigenous peoples’ organizations, should promote all kinds of adult education programs for continuing education in environment and development, basing activities around local problems.

These authorities and industry should encourage business, industrial and agricultural universities or higher institutions to include such topics in their curricula. The corporate sector could include sustainable development in their education and training programs.

Role of media

One of the most effective ways of getting the message across to the largest possible audience in a country diverse as Sri Lanka is through the mass media, including television and the English and vernacular press. Both these media have the potential of being extremely effective tools for environmental communication. However, they have not been sufficiently exploited for this purpose so far.

The television provides an excellent opportunity to reach out to the literate as well as the illiterate population of the country. Since the advent of satellite television, TV today attracts audiences ranging from the educated elite to poor villagers in all parts of the county. The vastly increased penetration of TV to all sections of Sri Lankan society remains under-utilised in terms of this objective. There is a great dearth of good programs on TV and very few incisive articles on environmental issues in the written press.

Most environmental documentaries shown on TV today attract few viewers because of the academic or pedantic manner in which they are presented. Similarly, although many English newspapers are now carrying more and more features on environmental issues, they are usually superficially researched and poorly written. Vernacular papers still carry very little or no environmental news.

There is a famous saying: “If you plan for one year, plant rice, if you plan for ten years plant trees, and if you plan for hundred years educate people”. So if we want to save our country and the mother earth, there is a strong need to conserve our natural recourses and make judicious use of them. We must think earth as a habitat, not of today but of distant tomorrow where there will be a place and means for every being to live in harmony.

The preservation and conservation of environmental heritage is our sacred duty. All of us living on this planet, whether rich or poor, industrialist or workman, farmers or labourers, office goers or house wife, VIP or common men, as individuals or groups, are responsible for the present dismal state of our environment and each one of us has to contribute towards its rehabilitation, preservation and conservation.