Since 2010, September in the Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia (CAREC) in Almaty is a time of meetings with the young leaders of the region, representatives of Governmental bodies and public organisations of Central Asia.
In 2018, this tradition celebrated its 9th anniversary, and again, on September 17-26, 2018, the 9th Central Asian Leadership Programme on Environment for Sustainable Development (CALP) will be held in Almaty.
The 9th CALP is conducted by the Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia in cooperation with the United Nations Environment Programme and with the support of USAID, World Bank, European Union, OSCE, UNESCO and German-Kazakh University.
On September 17, 30 participants from Central Asia and Afghanistan, as well as partners and donors of CALP, will meet together in CAREC. Young specialists will take a training course on ecology and sustainable development and learn a lot about technologies and platforms for cooperation in the field of environment at the global and regional levels.
During the programme, regional and international experts will deliver lectures and workshops on various topics: biodiversity conservation, integrated water resources management, water diplomacy, climate change, solid waste management and "green economy". Several sessions will focus on leadership development, green business, innovation and negotiation techniques. It is worth noting that all sessions will include interactive tasks.
This year, CALP is closely linked to the Central Asian International Environmental Forum (CAIEF), which was held on June 5-8 in Tashkent. The programme will reflect the main focus of CAIEF 2018 - strengthening regional cooperation and making sustainable decisions in the field of environmental protection and sustainable development.
In this regard, during the 9th CALP participants’ selection process, the emphasis was made on increasing the capacity of the public sector representatives (nominated by state bodies of Central Asian countries and Afghanistan). Therefore, in 2018, the majority of the participants in the 9th CALP will represent ministries and agencies of environmental protection, water resources, energy and foreign affairs, which will be future decision-makers on environmental issues in the region.
On the final day, the CALP participants will visit a number of places in the Almaty region that apply environmental approaches: a solid waste processing plant, an AES power station and an eco-settlement of Almaraj. In the framework of the project "Straw paradise" the eco-settlement is actively introducing resource-saving technologies; there are also pilot sites for drip irrigation, permaculture, eco-construction, etc.