About 350 municipal employees are going to participate in hematic trainings on environment protection themes and get retrained. The initiative is fulfilled by the UNDP “Generate Global Environmental Benefits Through Environmental Education and Raising Awareness of Stakeholders” program.
The trainings are to be held in May-September at the Public Administration Academy of Armenia. The specialists of the Municipality will be familiarized with the new possibilities in the field of environment management, sustainable cities, renewable energy, energy efficiency, circular economy as well other environment-related fields of urban economy. The trainings will be conducted the specialists trained by American University of Armenia.
The First Deputy Mayor Hrachya Sargsyan, the UNDP Resident Representative in Armenia Dmitry Mariasin, First Deputy Minister of Nature Protection Irina Ghaplanyan, Deputy Minister if Territorial Administration and Development Lilia Shushanyan, other officials were present at the launch of the trainings.

“The success of each program depends on the quality of specialists. We may have good ideas but be unable to fulfill them because of the lack of professionals. I am sure the trainings will be effective. Yerevan Municipality is going to work out new programs using the skills gained due to the trainings”, said Hrachya Sargsyan.
“Such a big volume of environmental modules for the trainings of community and civil employees has been worked out in Armenian for the first time. We attach importance to this cooperation for instillation of the modules and ensuring further sustainability”, stressed Dmitry Mariasin.
The participants of the training also stressed the importance of the trainings and expressed willingness to apply the knowledge they gain in practice.
The program is financed by “Global Environmental Facility” (GEF) and co-financed by the UNDP. The goal of the project is to strengthen Armenia’s capacity to use environmental education and awareness raising as tools to improve the capacity of stakeholders involved in the management of natural resources. The representatives of both local self-governance bodies and state management and private sector participate in the project. Totally, 1000 specialists will be trained.