May 30, 2016, President Soon-heung Chang delivered the welcome remarks at the 66^th UN NGO Conference, held at HICO, Gyeongju.

According to President Chang, “It was my great honor and pleasure to announce the start of the implementation of the ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ here in Gyeongju. It was my great honor to host the world’s prestigious UN civil society Conference for the first time in Asia.”

In addition, he added, “The UN NGO conference is very special because this venue was prepared through unprecedented cooperation with the UN, international society, the Korean government, the local government, NGOs and universities. Sustainable Development goals will not be achieved only by each government. The goals will be achieved through participation from every citizen. It needs to be implemented according to regional and countries’ situations or conditions. In this context, to build a venue for communication with private institutions, academia, and other organizations together and it is a very good example.” 

According to President Younggil Kim of the UN Academic Impact Korea and former first President of Handong Global University, “Education is the only key to resolve the problems in the 21^st century. When we change, the problems we caused can be changed fundamentally. However, current education trends just stress the quantitative growth. This is far short of nurturing future-oriented talents. We need a paradigm shift in the education field. “

He also added in his congratulatory speech, “The UN is suggesting new educational paradigms with global citizenship education with sustainable development goals. Global citizenship education talks about humankind who live together within the boundary called earth. In addition, it talks about the overall global village including the world economy, environment, and society.

President Kim said, “In this context, the 66^th UN NGO Conference was very meaningful since this venue will serve as platform to discuss the way forward for global citizen education with academia, NGOs, businesses, international organizations, and governments. Today’s partnerships will open the gate to ‘practice’ by passing through the tunnel of long ‘discussion’. Now we need everyone’s participation.”

The conference lasted to June 1, 2016 and 48 different kinds of workshops were hosted under the theme of “Children, Refugees, and Global citizenship.” Over 100 display booths were prepared and 4,000 participants joined and this global NGO festival. 

링크 공유