Environmental Sustainability
At UFV, we place a high value on environmental, social, and economic sustainability in all our endeavours. Indeed, one of our strategic objectives as an institution is to ensure that the management and development of our facilities reflects the value of sustainability. We also aspire to be seen as a catalyst in community development and sustainability within the communities of the Fraser Valley.
To this end, UFV is planning to sign the Talloires Declaration within the coming months, and to guide our campus planning initiatives according to this important commitment:
Talloires Declaration
(1994 updated version, from Association of University Leaders for a Sustainable Future)
1. Increase awareness of Environmentally Sustainable Development – Use every opportunity to raise public, government, industry, foundation, and university awareness by opening addressing the urgent need to move toward an environmentally sustainable future.
2. Create an Institutional Culture of Sustainability – Encourage all universities to engage in education, research, policy formation, and information exchange on population, environmental and development to move toward global sustainability.
3. Educate for Environmentally Responsible Citizenship – Establish programs to produce expertise in environmental management, sustainable economic development, population, and related fields, ensure that all university graduates are environmentally literate and have the awareness and understanding to be ecologically responsible citizens.
4. Foster Environmental Literacy for all - Create programs to develop the capability of university faculty to teach environmental literacy to all undergraduate, graduate, and professional students.
5. Practice Institutional Ecology – Set an example of environmental responsibility by establishing institutional ecology policies and practices of resource conservation, recycling, waste reduction, and environmentally sound operations.
6. Involve All Stakeholders - Encourage involvement of government, foundations, and industry in supporting interdisciplinary research, education, policy formation and information exchange in environmentally sustainable development. Expand work with community and nongovernmental organizations to assist in finding solutions to environmental problems.
7. Collaborate for Interdisciplinary Approaches - Convene university faculty and administrators with environmental practitioners to develop interdisciplinary approaches to curricula, research initiatives, operations, and outreach activities that support an environmentally sustainable future.
8. Enhance Capacity of Primary and Secondary Schools - Establish partnerships with primary and secondary schools to help develop the capacity for interdisciplinary teaching about population, environment, and sustainable development.
9. Broaden Service and Outreach Nationally and Internationally - Work with national and international organizations to promote a worldwide university effort toward a sustainable future.
10 Maintain the Movement - Establish a Secretariat and a steering committee to continue this momentum, and to inform and support each other’s efforts in carrying out this declaration.
» Centre for Environmental Sustainability
