"In the future, I plan to work in the entrepreneurship field, maybe as a business developer or even with my own company. "

Far from bragging about it, 25 years old Hasan might be too modest to acknowledge he's part of Iraq's best chances for a brighter future. Born in Baghdad one year after the end of the first Gulf War, he grew up in a family of engineers that definitely nurtured his own interest for science.

“I had the idea in my mind since some time, but the courses I took helped me improve it. And since it also helped me to find more funds, it definitely helped the project to take off.”

 “We developed a small curriculum that introduced students and teachers at several schools to sustainability. The students and teachers then competed for the titles of Sustainable School and Sustainable Ambassadors.”

' This is a whole new approach, focusing not on the teacher but on the adult learners. This means forgetting the old pedagogic methods and embracing new pedagogic techniques.”

"I used to work in a more rigid, top-down way with people around me, giving instructions based on the elements I received. Since then, I learned to work in a more cooperative way, we are having more meetings, where everybody has a say."

“There is a tremendous work to be done, and we need to target influential individuals and institutions."

“We need to find different ways of talking to each other about climate change, rather than leaving this to formal education, and the best way to do this is to start young.”

Avoiding an ‘ecological credit crunch’ requires training and education for new skills and a change in attitudes to enable countries to leapfrog towards sustainable consumption and production practices. Children in Bhutan are proving to be valuable agents in this process.

“Domestic resources can mobilise a more immediate, nationally-driven response to climate change, and when aligned with external funding sources, can gain a much greater impact.”

By Sara Tchaparian // 14 November 2016 // Climate Finance