UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development: Conference Report by the General Rapporteur

Under the banner of ‘Learning Today for a Sustainable Future’, the World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development (WCESD), hosted in Aichi-Nagoya, from 10–12 November 2014, marked and celebrated the end of the United Nations (UN) Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD, 2005–2014). It also saw the launch of the Global Action Programme on Education for Sustainable Development and adoption of the Aichi-Nagoya Declaration. The DESD was established out of an agreement amongst Member States to strengthen the role of education in achieving sustainable development at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002. Through the adoption of Resolution 57/254 in 2002, the UN General Assembly declared the DESD, to take place from 2005 to 2014, and tasked UNESCO as the lead agency. The WCESD, organized at the end of the DESD by UNESCO and the Government of Japan, provided an important opportunity to consolidate the outcomes of the DESD, and to frame the way forward for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) at global level.