An informational meeting on the topic "Decentralization - local self-government - gender policy, Georgia" was held in Poti City Hall. Representatives of Fund "Sukhumi" provided attendees with information on the current situation regarding the above mentioned topic and the organization’s experience.

Among participants of the meeting there were active members of society, representatives of local self-government of Poti and the media. They actively joined in the discussion on gender policy issues.

The meeting was held within the framework of the project - “Learning from Visegrad 4 experience to advocate for equal, inclusive and democratic local governance”.

The project is implemented with the support  of the Visegrad Fund

Fund "Sukhumi" organized a meeting on the topic "Local Gender Policy - Prospects and Challenges" in the meeting room of the regional administration of Guria.

The meeting was attended by members of Gender Equality Councils of Guria municipalities, government officials, colleagues invited from Imereti, media and NGO representatives.

Participants of the meeting exchanged information and experiences on positive practice of gender mainstreaming in municipalities, assessed challenges in the work of local gender Equality Councils.

"We would like to learn from a positive experience of other Councils, especially the pilot Gender Advisory Councils of Fund „Sukhumi”, the one of which worked for three years in Ozurgeti. We think that information exchange system would be very useful for all, - said attendees.

The information meeting was held within the framework of the project "Learning from Visegrad 4 experience to advocate for equal, inclusive and democratic local governance". During the next stage, a strategy will be developed and gender mainstreaming at the local level will be advocated.

The project is implemented with the support of the Visegrad Fund

A meeting of experts, involved in the research, was held in Budapest on March 7-8 in the frames of the project “Learning from Visegrad 4 experience to advocate for equal, inclusive and democratic local governance”. Experts shared Visegrad countries experiences on gender mainstreaming, public participation in local governance and advocacy of political reforms and started work on a draft of the Policy-oriented Strategy for reforming local governance and gender mainstreaming in Georgia. Future project activities were planned.

A representative from the Visegrad Fund attended the meeting. She got acquainted with activities held in the frames of the project with interest and emphasized that the Visegrad Fund welcomes information sharing on gender issues, expanding of partners’ network and a tendency of gender mainstreaming in local governance.

The project is implemented with the support of the Visegrad Fund

Tskaltubo WSC chose the Rugby team of the Tskaltubo club “Dinozaur” as a face of the campaign.

The project center “No to violence against women!” was leaded by the preparatory work – informational meetings with the rugby team “Dinozaur” and with representatives of local self-government. There were published informational leaflets and poster-calendars with the photo of rugby players. There were planned activities on a rugby stadium, but due to the bad weather the rugby match was not held. So the project was corrected – activities of the center conducted two activities. This is informational meeting with the parents of the kindergarten children. On December 3 in the international day of the people with disabilities in the inclusive center of Tskaltubo. There was held competition of the paintings on: “Family without violence”!

All participants of the meetings heard information about a campaign about how the violence effects children’s psychics. According to the attendants, these meetings were actual and useful.

Group of civil initiatives of Khoni was actively involved in the campaign of 16 active days, organized by the fund “Sukhumi”. Leaders of the group conducted informational-educational meeting in Khoni library with pupils of upper grades of Khoni public school on December 6. They spoke about the reasons of violence, its social results, ways of prevention.

How to overcome the violence, where is the role of society – interesting discussion was held regarding these issues.

Khoni WSC, School No7 of Poti and school of village Koki (Zugdidi Municipality) – three more informational meetings were held in youth clubs.

The topic is actual and important: gender violence, reasons and mechanisms of prevention.

Meeting participants discussed the reasons of violence, spoke about mentality. One participant, whose mother is abroad, noted: "I can not understand father who does not work and always asks money from mother. We have repeatedly suggested him to go to work, and my mother would came home, but in vain ... I will do everything for not to live like this. My family - a lesson for me. "