Azerbaijan, Baku / Trend / BP and its partners in the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) and the South Caucasus pipeline (SCP) projects presented a Green Pack ecological project jointly with OSCE on 19 November.
This joint initiative entails a contribution to the increase of public awareness of school children about the environment and general education in Azerbaijan.
Green Pack is a multimedia, interactive educational tool, which targets increasing the awareness of school children and teachers on the environment.
This project commenced in 2004, and three years were required to develop approximately 1,000 Green Packs to spread around schools in Baku, Ganja, Sumgayit, Lankaran, Yevlakh, Kurdamir and Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. The Pack includes textbooks for children, films in DVD, CDs and games.
The Green Pack idea evolved in the UK and is presently used as part of school curriculums in Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, UK, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Russia, Albania, Belarus and Macedonia. This educational pack is adapted to environmental issues of Azerbaijan and was issued in Azerbaijani.
The Azerbaijani version of Green Pack was developed through the joint effort and cooperation and support of big group of leading national non-governmental organizations involved in environmental issues, academic institutes and regulating bodies. The content of the pack was adopted by the Azerbaijani Education Ministry and Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources, and afterwards was included in the curriculum of national schools.
Moreover, under the project training was organized for teachers and instructors from regional education departments, to guide them in efficient teaching of Green Pack materials. The successful teachers and instructors will become propagators of Green Pack to ensure long-term delivery of knowledge and skills on issues touched upon in this project.
Financed by BP and its partners in the BTC and SCP projects jointly with the OSCE Baku Office, the project was implemented by the Regional Ecological Center (REC) for Central and East Europe ( Hungary) with the cooperation of Azerbaijani national non-governmental organization Society for Sustainable Development (FSDS). The total budget of the project is approximately $400,000. BP's contribution to this project comprised $300,000 and the OSCE Baku Office - approximately $100,000.