AIT recently played host to the Research Colloquium of UNEP Asia Pacific Regional University Consortium (RUC) on Environment for Sustainable Development. The two-day event on April 24 - 25 attracted academics (above) from Australia, America, China, and Japan.
To begin the colloquium, Prof. Mario Tabucanon welcomed all members to the RUC Research Colloquium and introduced the program of the day. He was followed by Prof. Vilas Wuwongse, Vice President – External Relations, AIT, who welcomed all participants to AIT, and detailed AIT’s specific activities and academics related to the environment and development. Mr. Surendra Shrestha, Regional Director UNEP informed the meeting that as the consortium was now five years old, there was a need for change in its outlook to address the new and emerging challenges with regard to the environment.
Prof. Fengteng Li from Tongji University, China, delivered a message from Bayer, China, and along with Dr Guo Ru (also from Tongji University) presented the educational and outreach activities of IESD. This was followed by discussions on RUC’s involvement and support for IESD activities. Later, a progress report on the ongoing RUC research projects (Tongji/IESD) was presented by Dr. Guo Ro. During the following session, presentations on project proposals submitted in October 2007 by AIT, Tongji University and UNU were presented and discussed.
In the final session of the day, Mr. Mahesh Pradhan presented the strategic directions for research, including UNEP’s medium term strategy (MTS) for themes such as climate change, disasters and conflict, ecosystem management, environmental governance, hazardous waste and resource efficiency. The members agreed that the RUC research projects would henceforth focus on climate change, environment, rural poverty and CSR and would have to cater to a set of criteria. Three consolidated projects were agreed for implementation in 2009. The next RUC meeting will take place in Shanghai on 21 September 2008.
The Research Colloquium was attended by Prof. Deo Prasad (University New South Wales), Prof. M. Sivakumar (Univesity of Wollongong – AIT alumnus), Prof. Li Fengting (Tongji University), Dr Guo Ru (Tongji University), Dr Wang Jing Yuan (Nanyang Technological University), Prof. Vilas Wuwonge (AIT), Prof S. Kumar (AIT), Dr Mokbul Morshed Ahmad (AIT), Dr Animesh Dutta (AIT), Prof. Yajie Song (Yale University), Mr. Yoshihiro Natori (UNU-IAS), Dr Zinaida Fadeeva (UNU-IAS), Mr Surendra Shrestha (UNEP - AIT alumnus), and Mr Mahesh Pradhan (UNEP - AIT alumnus).