The Fund "Sukhumi" in partnership with the Association "Peaceful and Business Caucasus" and with the support of the USAID is implementing the project “Bridging the Gap: People to People Initiatives for Conflict Resolution”.
The project has been actively started since February and includes civil, educational, medical and economic areas.
Numerous activities are planned during two years on both sides of the conflict dividing line. Youth clubs and councils will be established in 11 municipalities, trainings and meetings will be held, exchange programs will be organized, small grants will be funded, etc.
All of these activities are based on a trilateral strategy: overcoming mistrust through personal contacts, identifying common topics, finding and supporting ways of reconciliation.
The project is implemented with the support of the USAID
The next meeting of the Project Coordination Council was held today. The meeting discussed the current project activities, in particular the process of preparing the third monitoring of the report on public administration reform, the next training scheduled in March for the member organizations of the Forum and other future plans.
The work is carried out in the framework of the project “A common forum for CSOs from Guria, Imereti and Racha-Lechkhumi for PAR Roadmap monitoring”.
Violence is very often caused by gender stereotypes, so it is necessary to solve them, and the school can play a major role in this process.
“Gender stereotypes and the role of schools in their solution” is a short film prepared by the Tbilisi Representative Office of the Fund “Sukhumi”. The film shows one of the directions of the Fund "Sukhumi" - work with youth and the results of this work, the experience and the lessons learned.
"Young leaders for peace, tolerance and non-violent culture" - this is the name of new project of the Fund "Sukhumi".
First of all, schools and participants under the age group envisaged in the project - pupils of the eighth-eleventh grades were selected.
The project includes 8 schools of Kutaisi, Zugdidi and Tsalenjikha municipalities.
At the first stage of the work envisaged the survey on: how tolerant, sociable and peaceful adolescents are and how they contribute to the formation of a non-violent culture.
Fifty questionnaires are filled in, they are in the process of adaptation and in parallel, preparation for the next project activities is underway.
Searching for the funds, registtarion of civic organizations, self-presentation, presentation of results - all these questions were necessary, interesting and useful. Therefore, the mobilizers of the Women Support Centers were actively involved participated in the process of two-day online training.
The participants got acquainted with the procedure of registering the organization, with the necessary documents. Particularly interesting was the part of the training, which was devoted to the skills of self-presentation, presenting the results of activities and formulating these results in a success story.
The pandemic has taught Forum Theatre actors many new things: shooting videos, editing, selecting music backgrounds, etc.
Young people worked online in February too. Their work, personal videos on various topical issues, has appeared on the Facebook page of Fund "Sukhumi".
From March, Forum Theatre actors will perform in various city parks and squares.
Fifteen new organizations have been added to civil society in 8 municipalities. It is one of the most important results of our project. After the registration, necessary training is provided to them.
The representatives of these organizations have attended the training on the topic "Development of projects and grant applications" and got acquainted with the process and stages of drafting project grant applications. Despite the online format, the training has been conducted with the active involvement of the participants. The discussed theoretical issues and specific examples will help them develop a project idea according to the application form.
On February 18-19, a two-day training was held with representatives of local self-governments of Imereti, Samegrelo, Guria and Adjara. The issue of the strategy of gender equality, organizational, technical and methodological aspects of the municipality was discussed on the first day. The second day was devoted to the development of municipality action plans.
The training participants had interesting presentations on the approaches existing in the municipalities, successful practices and challenges.
“A very necessary project”, “You are really doing a big job”, “Training on these issues, should take place throughout Georgia”, “I am ready to cooperate”, “The conflict expert is already working in a second circle in our school. “Our school is always open for you", "Thank you very much for the work done", "We are waiting for you in Chokhatauri municipality, we promise to work actively"," We follow your work, and are delighted with your young people"- these and similar considerations were expressed or recorded in a chat during a meeting on the Zoom platform.
