SDSN Bulgaria Welcomes SDSN Australia, New Zealand and Pacific

Prof. John Thwaites, Chair of SDSN Australia, New Zealand and Pacific, paid an official visit to SDSN Bulgaria. During his visit, he delivered a public lecture entitled “Net Zero on Campus: Universities as Living Laboratories for Climate Action” on the occasion of the 106th anniversary of the University of National and World Economy (UNWE), the host university of SDSN Bulgaria.

Prof. Thwaites was introduced to the audience by the Rector of UNWE and Co-Chair of SDSN Bulgaria, Prof. Dr Dimitar Dimitrov, who also presented him with the UNWE Honorary Medal.

In his lecture, Prof. Thwaites highlighted UNWE’s contribution to advancing the Sustainable Development Goals and emphasised that “this is exactly the kind of university leadership the world now needs.” He noted:

UNWE is already well placed to contribute to that European collaboration. Through SDSN Bulgaria, your climate and sustainability programmes, your student engagement initiatives and your practical campus decarbonisation projects, this university is already demonstrating many of the characteristics of a living laboratory for sustainability. The future of climate action will depend not only on new technologies, but on whether institutions can learn from each other quickly enough and scale what works.

The full text of Prof. Thwaites’ lecture is available here.

After the lecture, Prof. Thwaites held a discussion with Prof. Dimitrov and Assoc. Prof. D.Sc. Michael Musov on the Post-2030 Agenda and SDSN’s contribution to it. The discussion was followed by a commemorative photograph in front of the monument to Prof. Bobchev, founder and first Rector of UNWE. The symbolic setting linked UNWE’s academic tradition with its growing engagement in international sustainability cooperation.