Ecological education and awareness
- Empowerment of the elder generation, eg. in public open universities
- International exchange and cooperation of adult education within all Danube Region
- Raising capacity on methods, eg. role models
Inter-generational communication
Every young generation needs to be sensibilised for nature and sustainability:
- Elderly people support the youth to develop relation and respect towards the nature, eg. showing the beauty of local nature by common walks
- Know-how transfer from old to young on the local nature and changes of the environment
- Explaining the risks of hazardous technologies to the youth, eg. nuclear power
Getting active on local level
Elder people bring in their experience in their environment:
- Engagement of elderly people in ecological projects, eg. community gardens, separation of waste
- Citizens´participation in Local Agenda 21 helps to raise the motivation with elderly people to take responsibility for their personal environment and move political decisions
- Analysing of the needs in the local environment, strengthening of the social community
- Reflect the personal way of mobility – adapt related to the different needs and environmental aspects, eg. Car-sharing
Implementation of sustainable development to public life
The elder generation expects clear perspective and responsibilities for a natural and save future for their children and grand-children:
- Consequent securing of water resources in public hands
- Raising awareness for the limited availability of resources
- Developing hydro-power only by innovative engineering solutions (eg. pump-storage-plants) with little negative effect on eco-systems and not huge dam constructions along theDanubeand the tributaries with strong negative climate and eco-system effects
- Step-by-step reduction of nuclear power in all Danube Region within 20 years – no more investment and substitution by renewable energy sources (solar, wind, water…)
- No abuse of south-easternEuropefor the ongoing increase of energy use in central European countries
- Establishing of state-of-the-art Environmental Impact Assessments
- Adapt the public traffic in a flexible and innovative way in regions to keep up or develop cost-effective high quality – eg. national wide tickets for all traffic companies, adapting bus size…
Foster natural and regional food production
In the upcoming programs on the Common agricultural policy (CAP) the following aspects need to be taken into account with priority:
- Regional, organic food is a main pillar of a healthy natural life style – it needs to raise the level of information for consumers to seasonal changes in the availability of products
- Fair trade is a minimum standard for superregional products – eg. From southern countries
- Decentral production secures the small scale structure of agriculture in Europe and reduces traffic – to develop the next period of support systems in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) it needs to integrate the ecological footprint of production and the farm size as factors
- Securing the system of decentral agricultural production in the property of farmers
- There is no acceptance for genetic modified organisms (GMO)
On Sunday, 19 June, an eco-workshop was held in Brodarica. Every group of students from various countries (Slovenia, Romania, Bulgaria, Austria, Germany and Croatia) presented their four, most important eco-messages for the protection of the planet Earth. Among them, according to the common thoughts, the following three conclusions were defined:
1. Enact enforceable laws in line with the EU, particularly related to nature water conservation.
2, Systematic education from an early age to develop environmental awareness of citizens, with special emphasis on respect to nature.
3. Us some knowledge about the nature of the past to preserve its future.
These conclusions were made very easily and quickly, but to achieve and implement them will be much harder.