ESD had its own dedicated session during the Mediterranean Stakeholder Forum on Environment and Climate Action – “Making the Behavioural Shift Happen: NGOs/CSOs, Parliamentarians, Journalists, Women and Youth organisations and other actors meet in Cairo”! The Forum organised with the support of the EU-funded WES-BCA and GEF-funded MedProgramme, in Cairo (Triumph Plaza Hotel ) on 21-23 October 2025 within which Session 6 on  “Advancing Education for Sustainable Development to Drive Transformative Change at the Individual, Institutional, and Collective Level” was held on its 2nd day (22 October).

The session aimed at offering the opportunity for interactive sharing and reflecting on good practices capitalizing on stakeholders’ initiatives and engagement for promoting ESD in the region.During the session the panelists reflected on how stakeholders can be further engaged and contribute for mainstreaming and promoting ESD in the region at the national and local levels as well as how to motivate organisations, sectors and communities in undertaking concrete transformative ESD actions to the implementation of the MSESD Action Plan towards 2030.

The session was moderated by Dr Aravella Zachariou, Ministry of  Education of Cyprus, Chair of UNECE ESD Committee, Chair of the MCESD, and begun with a short “setting-the-context” intervention by Prof Scoullos on the MSESD process and updates. The  two panels that followed included interesting insights, concrete examples and case studies on applying the provisions of the MSESD and its Action Plan by various stakeholders at formal and non-formal education settings:

Panel 1. Insights from good practices of formal and non-formal ESD promoting the MSESD/Action Plan towards 2030
– Ms Hasnaa CHEHABI, Cheffe de service des programmes de l’éducation environnementale, Ministère de la transition Energétique et du Développement Durable (Morocco)
– Ms Ghada AHMADEIN, Program Director at the Arab Network for Environment and Development (RAED) (Egypt)
– Ms Sallama NAMANI, Environment / Development Program Manager – Consultant to President, MAKHZOUMI FOUNDATION (Lebanon)
– Ms Sara ZEKAJ, Stakeholders Engagement Officer @ Young Professional Network (Albania)
– Prof. Mohamed FTOUHI, Mohamed V University of Rabat & CMED President (Morocco)

 Panel 2. Highlights of best practices of Whole Institute Approach in Tertiary Educational Institutes
– Ms Petra KEZMAN, Union for the Mediterranean, Higher Education and Research Division
– Prof. Adil SALHI, Abdelmalek Essaâdi University (Morocco)
– Prof. Habib BEN BOUBAKER, ASMP Kelibia/University of Manouba (Tunisia)
– Dr. Hadjer BOULILA, Associate Professor, University of Tlemcen & Mediterranean Youth Group (Algeria)
– Prof Maria Fernanda Rollo, UNESCO CHAIR in Biodiversity Safeguard for Sustainable Development (Portugal)

One day earlier, on 21 October, a closed Meeting of the Bureau of the Mediterranean Committee on Education for Sustainable Development (MCESD) was held as well, during which the members discussed about the activities achieved (period Dec.2022-Aug.25) as well as the proposed – by the Secretariat – orientations and outline of the MCESD activities for the period 2026 and 2027.

Read more about the Forum here.

-> Stay tuned for the upcoming Forum’s Recommedations, including the ones stemmed from the ESD sessions too!