Awareness-raising and development education

The work of aware­ness-rais­ing and devel­op­ment edu­ca­tion, par­tic­u­lar­ly at the nation­al lev­el, also forms part of the chal­lenge of pover­ty erad­i­ca­tion. The aim of these activ­i­ties is to raise pub­lic aware­ness in Lux­em­bourg of the var­i­ous themes that relate to the sus­tain­able devel­op­ment of coun­tries and rela­tions between coun­tries, includ­ing fair inter­na­tion­al trade. They also aim to ensure that from an ear­ly age mem­bers of the pub­lic acquire the knowl­edge and skills need­ed to under­stand and engage in crit­i­cal think­ing about the caus­es and con­se­quences of pover­ty, and take an active role in the devel­op­ment of fair­er and more inclu­sive societies.

Projects and pro­grammes are guid­ed by the exper­tise of NGDOs, acquired through expe­ri­ence in the field, as well as by Agen­da 2030 and the 17 sus­tain­able devel­op­ment goals, to account for the com­plex­i­ty of the chal­lenges of our soci­ety in its social, eco­log­i­cal and eco­nom­ic dimen­sions. These include inequal­i­ties, human rights, gen­der equal­i­ty, food sov­er­eign­ty, the pro­mo­tion of a cul­ture of peace and non-vio­lence, cli­mate change, pro­duc­tion chains, etc.

Nation­al NGDOs there­fore play an essen­tial role in the imple­men­ta­tion of aware­ness-rais­ing and devel­op­ment edu­ca­tion activ­i­ties in Lux­em­bourg. In 2022, for exam­ple, the Lux­em­bourg Devel­op­ment Coop­er­a­tion co-financed 8 annu­al projects and 15 three-year frame­work agree­ments with a total bud­get of EUR2 846818.14.

In order to pro­mote increased cit­i­zen involve­ment, the Lux­em­bourg Devel­op­ment Coop­er­a­tion also pro­motes joint ini­tia­tives and cam­paigns between NGDOs on spe­cif­ic devel­op­ment themes as well as on sus­tain­able devel­op­ment in gen­er­al. With­in this frame­work, the MFA allo­cat­ed an amount of EUR1 010679.96 (100% co-financ­ing rate) to two imple­ment­ing man­dates in the field of aware­ness-rais­ing and devel­op­ment edu­ca­tion: the Third World Infor­ma­tion Cen­tre (CITIM) and the Rethink your Clothes campaign.

The MFA has con­tin­ued to pro­vide financ­ing under the Third World Infor­ma­tion Centre’s (CITIM) man­date to ASTM, which has since 1982 been pro­vid­ing spe­cialised doc­u­men­ta­tion and edu­ca­tion on the coun­tries of the Glob­al South, North-South rela­tions and human devel­op­ment. This doc­u­men­ta­tion is made avail­able to the gen­er­al pub­lic in the form of a library. Since 1 Jan­u­ary 2015, the min­istry has pro­vid­ed 100% of the fund­ing for CITIM. In addi­tion, in 2022, Fair­trade Let­ze­buerg a.s.b.l. and Fon­da­tion Car­i­tas Lux­em­bourg were man­dat­ed to imple­ment the third phase of the Rethink your Clothes cam­paign, which aims to raise aware­ness of the social and eco­log­i­cal chal­lenges of the tex­tile industry.

In the area of nation­al aware­ness-rais­ing and devel­op­ment edu­ca­tion poli­cies, the MFA has main­tained its rep­re­sen­ta­tion in the Inter­de­part­men­tal Com­mit­tee on Edu­ca­tion in Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment (CIEDD) with a view to defin­ing guide­lines for inte­grat­ing edu­ca­tion about sus­tain­able devel­op­ment into all lev­els of Luxembourg’s edu­ca­tion sys­tem. The CIEDD seeks to coor­di­nate these efforts with key insti­tu­tion­al stake­hold­ers and civ­il soci­ety actors.

The Lux­em­bourg Devel­op­ment Coop­er­a­tion also rep­re­sent­ed Lux­em­bourg with­in the Glob­al Edu­ca­tion Net­work Europe (GENE), with a view to improved mutu­al learn­ing and net­work­ing of the actors involved in devel­op­ment edu­ca­tion inter­na­tion­al­ly, across Europe and in Lux­em­bourg. In this con­text, Lux­em­bourg co-chaired, along­side Ire­land, the process of for­mu­lat­ing the Euro­pean Dec­la­ra­tion on Glob­al Edu­ca­tion to 2050, the strate­gic Euro­pean Frame­work for improv­ing and devel­op­ing glob­al edu­ca­tion in Europe to 2050. The dec­la­ra­tion, rat­i­fied in Novem­ber 2022, defines glob­al edu­ca­tion as edu­ca­tion at for­mal, non-for­mal and infor­mal lev­els, which allows peo­ple to crit­i­cal­ly reflect on the world and their place in it, to open up their hearts and minds to the real­i­ty of the world. It enables under­stand­ing and action to cre­ate a world of social and cli­mate jus­tice, peace, sol­i­dar­i­ty, equal­i­ty, sus­tain­abil­i­ty and inter­na­tion­al under­stand­ing. It involves respect for human rights and diver­si­ty, inclu­sion and a decent life for all. The draft­ing process was car­ried out in close col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Min­istry of Nation­al Edu­ca­tion, Chil­dren and Youth, to ensure con­sis­ten­cy between what is being done in Lux­em­bourg and what we pro­mote and sup­port internationally.