International ecodesign education

Abstract

Since the beginning of the 90's Ecodesign Education and Knowledge has been built up based upon Ecodesign methodology developments and experiences in education and in practice in demonstration projects. During the end of the 90's first attempts took place to transfer the created Ecodesign education and knowledge from Europe to other parts of the world like Central & Latin America, India and Africa. Because of the differences in economical, social and cultural contexts the European Ecodesign approaches had to be adapted to the local situations in order to become effective and successful. Based upon these experiences we came to the conclusion that in order to transfer Ecodesign knowledge in an effective way to the local receivers (students, consultants, professionals), the specific background and characteristics of the receiver and the local context should be taken (more) in mind. For example in the case of the development of an international Ecodesign course one should consider the following variables of the local receiver in order to prepare appropriate educational materials and methods of transfer: • The profession background (designer or engineer), • The experience (student or professional), • The learning style (e.g. the local teaching style and interaction with professors), • The local economical developments (levels of innovations, SMEs vs. big industries), • The cultural context (like e.g. uncertainty avoidance, hierarchy, team work) As part of the PhD research of the first author, a model for "International Ecodesign Education Development and Transfer" is under development taking into consideration the above mentioned and other personal and contextual variables. The model has been used to evaluate 6 international Ecodesign education and training projects (in Colombia, Spain, India, Central America, Belgium and Africa). The outcomes of the research will be used to develop the new United Nations Environment Program Ecodesign Manual called "D4S".