§ Mr. Paul MarsdenTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what assessment he has made of the environmental GLOBE projects carried out by schools; and if he will make a statement. [90400]
§ Mr. MealeGLOBE stands for Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment. It offers school children structured opportunities to carry out environmental experiments and compare results with other schools globally using the World Wide Web. In England it is managed by the Warwickshire Wildlife Trust, with a grant from my department's Environmental Action Fund (EAF), linked to private sector support from the ARC Environment Fund and the National Grid Company. The Warwickshire Wildlife Trust assesses the projects carried out by schools as part of its EAF funded work. We in turn assess their performance during each year of grant funding, and will carry out a more detailed terminal assessment at the end of the grant in April 2001.