Israel Chemicals, which is a cause of major environmental hazards in Israel, is funding a School of Sustainability in Herzliya
With shale oil funding green education in Jordan and major polluting Israeli companies paying to set up sustainability schools, green education is looking more like ‘greenwash’ every day. It recently emerged that Israel Chemicals and Oil Refineries Ltd, will be the founding funders of the School of Sustainability at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya. The two companies are better known for their environmentally unfriendly activities and exploitation of non-renewable resources such as oil and phosphates which are highly polluting.
According to a report at Haaretz, the school will be focusing on the importance of environmentally conscious business development and entrepreneurship. The first students will enrol this September and will be able to sign for a bachelor’s degree in sustainability studies. There will be also be an emphasis on sustainable and long-term development solutions to deal with water and energy resources.
The companies explained in a statement that the move is part of wider strategy to enhance knowledge on environmental issues and improve relations between academia and industry. The Interdisciplinary Centre in Herzliya remarked that financial support from corporations and businesses to set up an academic school was accepted practice among world leading universities. The School of Sustainability will cost an estimated NIS 7.5 million.
Whilst is is great to see a new academic institution set up with the aim of dealing with environmental issues, I think universities need to be wary of the power and influence that large corporations can wield. I am not saying that corporations who fund universities always seek some influence but it certainly undermines the independence of researchers and academics on certain issues.
Furthermore, I don’t really believe in the notion that it is better for polluting companies such as oil corporations to fund green projects. I worry that it may in some justify their (continued) work and ultimately, the money they use to fund these projects comes from profit garnered from exploiting natural resources to the detriment of our planet. Finally, before any organisations wants to portray itself as one with green credentials they need to show that they have applied these green principles to their own companies.
As one of the heads of the Knesset environmental-social lobby, MK Dov Khenin (Hadash), told Haaretz: “I am in favor of companies adopting a sustainability agenda but it has to start first with them in their own activities.”
: Image via HoriaVarlan/flickr.
For more on Greenwash and education see:
Shell To Fund Environmental Education In Jordan
Should Green Organisations Accept Sponsorship From Big Bad Corporations?
How Do You Stop Greenwash? Train Better Activists, Of Course
Author: Arwa Aburawa
Arwa is a Muslim freelance writer who is interested in everything climate change related and how Islam can inspire more people to care for their planet and take active steps to save it while we can. She is endlessly suspicious of all politicians and their ceaseless meetings, especially as they make normal people believe that they are not part of the solution when they are the ONLY solution. Her Indian auntie is her model eco-warrier, and when Arwa is not busy helping out in the neighborhood alleyway garden, swap shopping or attempting fusion vegetarian dishes- with mixed success, she’d like to add- she can be found sipping on foraged nettle tea.
The growth of all other species is limited by predators and the limited availability of food; but because humans are the top predator and control the food supply, their impulse to grow can only be stopped by ecocide and extinction, which appears to be happening as the ocean is trashed, the waters and food supply are tainted, and the ice caps melt away from pollution-generated global warming, leaving the rivers to run dry and the people to starve. Family planning education to peacefully reduce the human population, and 100% safe recycling of all human-generated waste materials could save them, but they are addicted to the growth of their wealth and power, regardless of consequences.