EcoPeace

EcoPeace Middle East is a unique organization that brings together Jordanian, Palestinian, and Israeli environmentalists in order to protect the shared environmental heritage of the region. EcoPeace seeks to advance both sustainable regional development and the creation of necessary conditions for lasting peace in the region. To further this goal, EcoPeace has offices in Amman, Bethlehem, and Tel-Aviv.

When EcoPeace was founded in 1994, it was the first time Egyptian, Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian environmentalists agreed to join forces. These environmentalists wanted environmental factors to be included in the regional development agenda. Since then, EcoPeace has grown into an important regional organization with a staff of 60 and hundreds of volunteers.

Today, EcoPeace works on projects that can be divided into three focus areas: geographic connection (uniting people with a shared ecosystem, despite political borders); socio-economic projects (focusing on issues such as water privatization, trade, sustainable development, and healthy food practices); and Climate Change, the enormous threat of which is amplified in a water-scarce region like the Middle East.

EcoPeace is a project oriented NGO, using both a “top-down” (advocacy) approach coupled with a “bottom-up” (grass roots / community) strategy that has proven to be a very effective model.

EcoPeace approaches cross border environment and peacebuilding issues by hiring local researchers – Palestinian, Jordanian and Israeli – to gain a regional understanding as to the root cause of a problem and then develop a common vision as to how they might be able to solve it. This regional strategy includes a road map in order to influence decision makers, the media and the general public. Once the common vision is developed, EcoPeace staff in each office presents the vision to their respective audiences; Palestinian to Palestinian, Jordanian to Jordanian and Israeli to Israeli.

For more information or to support EcoPeace, click here.