Opening marks were then provided by Mr Joji Miyamori, Senior Deputy Director of the Global Environment Division of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He emphasised that the ESD is the best tool to optimise the use of available resources to promote sustainable development. He also added that the on-going challenges in SIDS countries are everyone’s issue and it is our responsibility to share and address them with our children.

A brief overview of some of UNESCO's work on ESD in SIDS was presented by Mr Toshiyuki Matsumoto, UNESCO Education Programe Specialist in the Pacific. As part of its global ESD activities UNESCO has a number of targeted activities in SIDS countries of all three regions. These include Sandwatch, climate change and disaster risk reduction education, and indigenous knowledge, heritage and culture education. He announced a new partnership between UNESCO and the Government of Malaysia for Asia-Pacific but with a focus on SIDS. This partnership will develop teacher training for climate change and disaster risk reduction education.

Mr Gwang-jo Kim, Director of the UNESCO Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education and moderator for the side event, introduced the distinguished panellists who rounded out the session.

Ms Rosajilda Velez Canelo, Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development of the Dominican Republic, presented a short video on climate change education in her country. Working with technical ministries, teachers, and students, the Dominican Republic is taking this initiative nationwide.

Taking a different approach, Ms Elizabeth Wright-Koteka, Chief of Staff of the Cook Islands' Prime Minister's Office, told the audience a fictional story of a Cook Islands family from the remote island of Manahiki. The story illustrated that ESD is not just about what we teach in schools but about embedding an holistic process that adapts and changes as the needs of SIDS peoples change.

Mr Osman Mahomed, Executive Chairman of the Maurice Ile Durable Commission, provided an overview of Mauritius' partnership between government, community and the private sector, and the role that education is playing in achieving their sustainability goals.

The importance of heritage and culture was highlighted by Professor Konaiholeva Thaman, UNESCO Chair in teacher education and culture at the University of the South Pacific (the only UNESCO Chairholder from a Pacific SIDS country). Prof Thaman proposed that ESD needs to rethink the way that we develop and deliver education in SIDS as modern systems of education are based on different knowledge systems, learning methods and content, from those used by our ancestors to successfully live sustainable lives on islands.

Dr Denis Chang Seng, UNESCO Natural Sciences Programme Specialist in the Pacific, introduced the UNESCO programme Man and the Biosphere (MAB). This initiative promote the concept of Biosphere Reserves, of which there are currently 15 in SIDS, as learning laboratories and opportunities to bring ESD into the community and the classroom into the environment.

The final speaker, Ms Mette Wilkie, Director of UNEP's Division of Environmental Policy Implementation, announced two initiatives on environmental education. The first is the use of MOOCS (Massive Open Online Courses) to expand access to tertiary level environmental sciences courses. The second course to be released later this year will be on SIDS. The second initiative is a global network of universities featuring environmental sciences. She pointed out that as yet there are no SIDS universities in this network, but they are encouraged to join.

Mr Kim presented a draft outcome statement to the participants. This statement was developed based on recent consultation on the future education agenda and will be fed into the SIDS process, the ESD end of Decade Conference in November 2014, and the discussions on the post-2015 education agenda.