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Save the date for the Interreg South Baltic Annual Event 2019 – Let’s share and learn!

On 24-25 of September the 4th South Baltic Programme Annual Event will take place in Ostróda, a city located in the western part of the Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship in Poland. This year, the annual meeting will be dedicated to sharing experiences and learning from each other about important issues reaching the final stage of projects’ implementation.

Last year around 150 participants from different countries and institutions took part in the event in Klaipeda, Lithuania. This year we anticipate again a high interest as the Annual Event 2019 will give us an opportunity to meet across the exciting South Baltic projects!

Therefore, we invite project partners, representatives of local and regional authorities, scientists, researchers, businesses, NGOs, politicians interested in the fields of green technologies, environmental protection, maritime industry, labour market, sustainable tourism and transport.

The first day – networking, capitalisation and social activities

On the first day networking activities, seminars and discussions will give us an insight into the important issue of capitalisation. To strengthen and create new cooperation networks we, of course, took care of social activities.

The second day – communication, durability, future challenges and expectations

On the second day, two sessions of parallel workshops will be led by invited experts, Regional Contact Points and the Joint Secretariat team. You will have the opportunity to exchange with other experienced project partners on issues such as sustainability of results, the upcoming Programme Period and challenges in intercultural cooperation.

 You can find the  agenda for the detailed Event Programme on the SouthBaltic website here:
https://southbaltic.eu/-/save-the-date-for-the-interreg-south-baltic-annual-event-2019-let-s-share-and-learn-

The registration will be opened by the end of July. As the number of participants is limited, hold your travel arrangements until getting the confirmation of registration.

Stay tuned and see you in Ostróda this Autumn!!!

The SIA4Y “Right of information access from the youth perspective” workshop took place from 6th-7th March in Elblag, Poland!
The event was organized by the Association of Polish Communes of Euroregion Baltic and brought together 100 young people! There were participants from several Lithuanian cities (Telšiai, Vilnius, Eigirdžiai, Klaipeda), the Russian city of Kaliningrad, Sweden (city of Hässleholm), Poland (Elbląg, Gdańsk, Nowe Miasto Lubawskie, Iława, Dzierzgoń, Olsztyn, Gdynia, Słupsk, Otomin, Warsaw, Przezmark), Italy and Greece!
On 6th March, the participants from abroad arrived in Elbląg! There was a joint dinner and a small local tour by Mr Marcin Żuchowski and Ms Paulina Lieder before the participants’ went to rest and prepare for the forthcoming day!
On 7th March, the workshop ensued in the Town Hall of Elblag. It opened with a speech by Ms. Malgorzata Samusjew, Director of the Association of Polish Communes, workshop host organization. Ms. Valentina Scandola, organizer of the event, introduced the agenda of the day and launched a social media contest, giving later the floor to Ms Magda Leszczyna-Rzucidło, representing the Polish Economic Society Branch in Gdańsk, who introduced the project “SIA4Y- Strengthening Civil Society Participation through Public Information Access for European Youth”.
The day was divided into two main workshop sessions, whose main scope was to bring the topic of “right of information access” in the foreground, also trough a synergy between SIA4Y, CaSYPoT and SB YCGN project. The Association of Polish Communes of Euroregion Baltic, in fact, had a chance to keep a fil rouge with the youth-related activities that have been implemented in the last two years. The first one on “Responsible relationships and youth civic engagement”.
The first session was held by Marcin Żuchowski and Agata Ludwiczak, from the hosting organization. The second session, instead, counted on Mr Sergejus Muravjovas and Ms Ieva Duncikaite’s moderation from Transparency International Lithuania with the title: “Model Your Municipality: Participatory Budgeting Session”.
“Responsible relationships and youth civic engagement” session:
At their first task, the participants were divided into 8 groups and asked to answer questions on 8 youth tools, which had a distinct goal each, and were written on large pieces of paper across 8 separate tables. Each group would then proceed to the next table. The tools were: employment mobility, youth information, Youth Centers, youth media, Schools of the Future, School’s Youth Zone, Baltic Youth Week, SB YCGN local round-table meetings-suggestions.
Before the launch of the second session, the winners of the social media contest were prized with lots of tech prizes and the participants had a lunch break in an adjacent room where a rich buffet was laid out.
“Model Your Municipality: Participatory Budgeting Session”:
In this part, participants were partnered according to their home towns and asked to think of and create the budget for a common project that would benefit their municipalities. The allowed budget for the participants was 100 000 euros and they had to present their idea along with the expenses that it’d require. Afterwards, each group presented the idea they came up with and finally the audience had the chance to vote for the idea they considered most interesting and likely to be implemented. The team from Tricity area presented a beach cleaning system and received the most votes. Special mention should be made of the participants from the Elblag-Kaliningrad group who proposed an international cultural festival and the team from Nowe Miasto Lubawskie who presented a very detailed budget.
The workshop closed with a presentation by Mr Dominik Kwiatkowski about the participatory budgeting in the city of Słupsk and a focus group discussion conducted by Mr Marcin Żuchowski about the situation of youth in their schools. This last session was held in the frame of YCGN project.
In general, it was a really fun and educational workshop and its young participants had the chance to get more informed about their rights and opportunities to communicate with and influence their municipalities!

By IVY Theodora Chatzipanteli

We invite you to submit offers for the provision of National trainings, coaching sessions and training materials for the beneficiaries of the UMBRELLA project – Boosting cross-border cooperation capacities for local actors in the South Baltic Sea, co-financed by the INTERREG VA Poland- Denmark- Germany- Lithuania – Sweden program (South Baltic) 2014 – 2020

All documents necessary to submit an offer are available in the BIP (Biuletyn Informacji Publicznej) at the following link: https://bip.pomorskieregion.eu/zapytania-ofertowe-p14

The deadline for submitting offers is March 27, 2019 at 12.00.

The content of this website is the sole responsibility of the author and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union, the Managing Authority or the Joint Secretariat of the South Baltic Cross-border Cooperation Programme 2014-2020. The project UMBRELLA is partly financed from the Interreg South Baltic Programme 2014-2020 through the European Regional Development Fund.