UNEP
and UNESCO Announce a New and Updated Edition
of the Popular YouthXchange Training Kit
Paris/Nairobi – October 1st, 2008. How to
balance looking cool and feeling cool with
the need to combat climate are among the
key tips in the new United Nations YouthXchange
Training kit. This updated version of the
guide also gets to grips with the mountains
of waste emerging across the globe as a
result of today’s fast throw-away society
from mobile phones to fashion.
The 2008 Training Kit
on Sustainable Consumption, produced by
the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and
the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) is now in its second
edition. YouthXchange is a train the trainer
tool that aims to promote sustainable consumption
patterns among young consumers worldwide.
Among other novelties, this updated guide
includes a chapter on how to find a balance
between youths’ consumer aspirations of
dressing cool and fashionable while at the
same time being aware of the impact of their
consumption on, for example, climate change.
“YouthXchange is one of
the most important youth activities connected
to UNEP’s sustainable consumption and production
work - it provides us with content that
we are able to convey to other young people,
empowering them to make different choices
in their daily lives and be actors of change,”
says Gabriela Monteiro, a UNEP Tunza Youth
Advisor.
Young people today establish
their identities through what they buy and
seek social inclusion by purchasing the
newest and “coolest” products on the market.
Yet, when unguided, this consumption contributes
to problems such as ozone depletion, climate
change and hazardous wastes that not only
affect our daily lives but impact the entire
globe.
Through their daily
actions, people can increasingly reduce
their environmental impact. Well aware of
this, UNEP’s Division of Technology, Industry
and Economics (DTIE) and UNESCO decided
to update the 2002 guide to include today’s
trends. It provides statistics, case studies,
games, examples of companies going greener,
and alternatives for more sustainable lifestyles.
New to the guide are the following features:
a clear link between our consumption patterns
and climate change, a more substantial e-waste
section, updated data and scientific information
and two new chapters: one on the UN Decade
on Education for Sustainable Development
and one on fashion. Fashion feeds a growing
industry and ranks textiles and clothing
as the world’s second-biggest economic activity
for intensity of trade . However, human
rights and the environment pay a heavy price
– a price that people can increasingly choose
to lessen with the rise of ethical fashion.
Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary
General and UNEP Executive Director, said:
“Young people in developed and rapidly developing
economies can play a massive part in fighting
climate change while being cool and keeping
the planet cool too”.
“Through their purchasing
patterns, life-style choices and networks
with schools and universities to clubs,
the music scene and sports they can also
influence the wider world - influence that
will be vital for moving communities, companies
and countries to back a new UN climate change
deal in Copenhagen’s UN Climate Change Conference
in 2009” he added.
“This initiative, which
fits within the framework of the UN Decade
of Education for Sustainable Development
(DESD, 2005-2014), seeks to raise the awareness
of young people and make responsible consumers
of them,” said Koïchiro Matsuura, Director-General
of UNESCO “Buying a product, what ever it
is, is never a neutral act for the environment;
its production, its use and the management
of the waste it generates, all impact –
to a greater or lesser degree – on our planet.”
Through YouthXchange,
UNEP and UNESCO work together to show young
people that it is possible to translate
our aspirations for a better world into
everyday actions.
YouthXchange has been
translated and adapted in 19 languages and
is available in a bilingual (French and
English) website – www.youthxchange.net.
Ms. Morgan Strecker, YouthXchange
www.youthXchange.net
Nick Nuttall, UNEP Spokesperson/Head of
Media
