Objective 4:
Promoting education and awareness
about plant diversity

It is a puzzle that given the fundamental importance of plants, the need for plant conservation is appreciated so little. A targeted programme of awareness and education is necessary to highlight the importance and plight of wild plants and in turn to try to change human attitudes and behaviour.

While all major international treaties, as well as national and regional conservation strategies, rightly stress the general importance of environmental education in order to foster and promote environmentally responsible citizenship, more attention needs to be given to the specific importance of wild plants and the issues which affect them.

Awareness brings the issues relating to plant diversity to the attention of key groups who have the power to influence outcomes. Education is a set of processes that can inform, motivate and empower people to support plant conservation, not only by making lifestyle changes, but also through promoting change in the way that institutions, businesses and governments operate.

Awareness alone is not enough. It will only lead to conservation if interest is translated into action. Educational programmes are therefore necessary to influence the formal curricula of schools and universities, and also the work of national parks, museums and botanical gardens.

Within the European plant conservation community, botanic gardens are exceptionally well placed to promote education and awareness. Ideally, a communication, education and public awareness strategy, should be developed for many of the targets in the European Plant Conservation Strategy, as awareness raising is a cross cutting issue. However, it is clear that more funding will be needed to increase the capacity of institutions to implement this important work.

Further information

Global Strategy for Plant Conservation - targets adopted by CBD COP 6:

• The importance of plant diversity and the need for its conservation incorporated into communication, education and public awareness programmes

Suggested long term European action in the EPCS under this objective:

E38 Support education and awareness programmes in botanical institutions on plant conservation issues (e.g. the programmes of botanic gardens and natural history museums);

E39 Provide advice and encourage direct liaison with land managers to help reduce damage to wild plants. (e.g. by minimising the use of herbicides);

E40 Support initiatives to encourage the public to appreciate the diversity of wild plants and understand the environmental cost of "suburbanising" the countryside;

E41 Emphasise the importance of local patterns of genetic variation for plant conservation and landscape and habitat restoration.