Biodiversity And Education For Sustainable Development

This book gathers interdisciplinary reflections from researchers, educators, and other experts on the subject of biodiversity closer to education and learning. The book also highlights its role as an added value to strategic principles for healthy ecosystems and sustainable human development. It promotes critical thinking and foster practices and attitudes for Education for Sustainable Development reconciling education with principles of human behaviour and nature. Readers especially find this book a timely resource in light of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011–2020, the Aichi Targets, and the new EU biodiversity strategy “Our life insurance, our natural capital: an EU biodiversity strategy to 2020”. Along with the challenge of ecosystems and public health, biodiversity conservation is essential for humanity’s continued security and sustainability, as it touches on all aspects of people’s lives.

Drawing on experiences and insights from 16 megadiverse countries, this report examines how biodiversity is being mainstreamed in four key areas.

Biodiversity Is One Of The Major Global Resources. It Has Suffered From Diverse Natural And Man-Made Catastrophes But Continues To Provide Food, Medicinal Products And A Wide Range Of Other Materials Which Could Be Guranteed For The Future It Managed In A Sustainable Manner. Human Influence Is By Far The Greatest Threat To Diversity. No Part Of The Planet Escapes The Effects Of Human Activity, Which Affects Diversity Either Directly Or Indirectly. The Present Book Biodiversity For Sustainable Development Includes 21 Chapters On The Topics Which Are Contributing Towards This Goal. Chapters Related To Biodiversity Includes-Exploration, Utilization Conservation And Management Of Non-Timber Forest Resources, Biodiversity : The Impact Of Biotechnology, Gis-An Advanced Tool To Study Biodiversity, Some Threaten Plant And Animal Species Of Assam And Meghalaya Region, Sustainable Management Of Soil Fertility In Rainfed Farming Systems, Phytoplanktonic Diversity, Change Detection In Wetland Environment, Turnover Rate Of Forest Flover Liter And Biodiversity Aspects Of Biosphere Reserve. Articles Covers Information On Studies On Rhizobium Association With Sesbania Sps. Fundamental Facts About Grasses, Fruit Crops, A Viable Alternative To Shifting Cultivation, Ornithophitous Adaptations Of Some Plant Species, Primary Vascular Differentiation In Fabaceae, Antibacterial Properties Of Herbal Tooth Powder, Plants Used In Cosmetics. Some Articles Viz. Forensic Botany : Applications, Aspects And Prospects Of Plant Materials In Criminal Investigations, Village Scale Production And Use Of Leaf Concentrate And A Comparative Study Of The Functionality Of Plant Proteins And Their Uses In Food System Have Added Value To The Book. This Book Will Be Highly Beneficial To Students, Teachers And Research Workers In The Field Of Botany, Biodiversity Conservation And Environmental Science.

Globally, there is a need to promote and empower practical action towards better environmental conservation and greater sustainability; education aspires to achieve and motivate this – one mind at a time. This book advances a future-oriented vision of the development of environmental sustainability education in settings outside the high-school. It provides practical guidance for teacher practitioners and policy makers in community-oriented environmental sustainability education. It promotes a modern holistic approach to sustainability learning in and by the community through participative engagement with sustainability issues. Its special foci include working with volunteers and citizen scientists, through museums or through re-purposing Higher Education. Its approach emphasises the implementation of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals and cooperation with environmental management professionals. This book’s cosponsors include the International Association for Headwater Control and FAO – European Forestry Commission’s Working Party on the Management of Mountain Watersheds, as well as the International Environmental Education Conferences, Eger, Hungary and the Hungarian Academy of Science’s Subcommittee on Future Studies. Community education has long been a goal for environmental management, whose practitioners realise that interventions, such as biodiversity conservation, are only truly sustainable when supported by the local land-user and stakeholder communities; this depends upon these stakeholders’ understanding why intervention is necessary.

This Book presents innovative and state of the art studies developed in Environmental Education in different countries to highlight this theme and promote its implementation all over the world. It will give a scientific perspective of Nature-based solutions to promote environmental education in all citizens and a more educational perspective as to how this approach can be implemented at schools and universities. Not less important is that includes science communication as a key factor for training and disseminating about the environment. The invited authors are recognized experts with excellent work developed in Environmental Education. This contributed volume presents innovative and creative work in the area giving a step forward in the implementation of Environmental Education, namely as a target of 2020 United Nations Agenda for Sustainable Development. The invitation of authors from many different countries allows the creation of a network and subsequently the book will bring concrete ideas as to how to develop operational capacities to bring added values to Environmental Education at an international level.

UNESCO Biosphere Reserves (BRs) are designated areas in geographical regions of global socio-ecological significance. This definitive book shows their global relevance and contribution to environmental protection, biocultural diversity and education. Initiated in the 1970s as part of UNESCO’s Man and Biosphere (MAB) Programme, BRs share a set of common objectives, to support and demonstrate a balance between biodiversity conservation, sustainable development and research. The world’s 701 BRs form an international, intergovernmental network to support the aims of sustainability science, but this purpose has not always been widely understood. In three distinct sections, the book starts by outlining the origins of BRs and the MAB Programme, showing how they contribute to advancing sustainable development. The second section documents the evolution of BRs around the world, including case studies from each of the five UNESCO world regions. Each case study demonstrates how conservation, sustainable development and the role of scientific research have been interpreted locally. The book concludes by discussing thematic lessons to help understand the challenges and opportunities associated with sustainability science, providing a unique platform from which lessons can be learned. This includes how concepts become actions on the ground and how ideas can be taken up across sites at differing scales. This book will be of great interest to professionals engaged in conservation and sustainable development, NGOs, policy-makers and advanced students in environmental management, ecology, sustainability science, environmental anthropology and geography.