MORE than 13,000 primary schoolchildren from East Anglia are being invited to a £175,000 festival designed to highlight conservation and environment problems.

MORE than 13,000 primary schoolchildren from East Anglia are being invited to a £175,000 festival designed to highlight conservation and environment problems.

They will visit a specially created rain forest, experience life on the ocean bed and learn how to dispose of waste in the Festival of ConScience.

The three-day event will be held at Woodbridge School and David Bellamy, patron, will visit it daily. He said the children will take a deep dip into Earth's inner space, go on safari through the sticky heat of a rainforest and explore the environment of their own back yard.

The project has been designed to encourage a greater awareness of the need for conservation among primary aged schoolchildren and it will be free for all visiting schools from Suffolk, North Essex and South Norfolk.

John Curtin, business manager at Woodbridge School Enterprises, decided to design the project in the Year of Science after discovering that 100 acres of rainforest disappear and 60 ocean species are lost daily.

Mr Curtin said: ''In 40 years' time these facts combined with added pollution levels will bring about devastating greenhouse effects upon the world unless people start to do something now.

''This very interactive event is planned to educate our young people and to encourage them to play their part in controlling the future of their planet. Everyone can do something, whether it is recycling or electing not to buy hardwood furniture. If enough people are prepared to take a positive approach to conservation it will make a big difference.''

The county council has produced information for teachers to tie in the visit with the National Curriculum. Apart from the exhibitions inside buildings there will be a woodland walk in the school grounds and this will be a lasting conservation project.

Jane Bourne, county adviser for science, said: ''This is a unique event which will provide over 13,000 pupils in Suffolk with a fascinating learning experience. The wider community will also benefit from the lasting features of the festival. It will provide pupils with an out of classroom experience that could not possibly be provided in individual schools.''

The festival will be held on July 9,10 and 11 and on July 10 it will be open, free of charge, to the public in the evening.