Vietnam develops national education for sustainable development initiative

UNESCO has launched and promoted such initiatives across the world, particularly in countries and territories that are highly vulnerable to climate change and extreme weather.

Speaking at the event, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Van Phuc emphasised the important role of education and training in addressing global challenges and ensuring sustainable development.

He said the Government of Vietnam has had policies and actions to increase the quality of education and training. However, to make education and training a driver for sustainable development, more things need to be done, he said.  

To implement Vietnam's commitment at the UNESCO international conference on education for sustainable development in 2021, the ministry has built a national education for sustainable development initiative until 2030, as a strategy to strengthen existing efforts and promote coordination, towards nationwide impacts.

He added that sustainable development is not only about economic and social development, protecting the ecological environment, but also ensuring basic human needs, including development for the happiness of humanity. Therefore, Vietnam set a target of building happy schools.

For her part, Miki Nozawa, education team leader at the UNESCO Hanoi Office, said sustainable development education can equip learners from preschool with important knowledge, critical thinking, and teamwork skills to solve sustainability challenges.

Therefore, sustainable development education has become more important than ever. UNESCO is pleased that the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam has initiated a national education for sustainable development initiative until 2030 and that many stakeholders are willing to participate in this process, she said.

Participants at the workshop discussed the current situation of education for sustainable development in Vietnam and gave opinions to the draft national education for sustainable development initiative. They also identified and agreed on the next direction, an inter-sectoral coordination mechanism to implement the initiative.