On May 13, the Economic Policy Research Center hosted the second batch of the three-day Boot Camp in Tbilisi. The Camp is organized for the representatives of Armenian and Georgian civil society organizations within the framework of the SDC-funded project “ACTION – Activating Civil Society Organizations through Training and Inclusive Operational Network”.
Danielle Meuwly, Regional Director of the Swiss Cooperation Office for the South Caucasus, Embassy of Switzerland in Georgia, and Irina Guruli, Deputy Director at the Economic Policy Research Center, attended the opening ceremony and made the welcoming remarks.
“Effective networks are crucial for extending the reach to poor and marginalized groups of society, achieving greater influence in policy and increasing social development impact. The three-day Boot Camp, which is part of the ACTION project, is designed to offer the participants an opportunity to activate such a network – the Georgian-Armenian Civil Society Network – and stimulate their engagement for the benefit of inclusive democratic processes and better development outcomes,” Danielle Meuwly noted in her address to the participants.
“Within the project ACTION, we have already hosted the very first batch of the participants. The feedback we received, proved that the Civil Society representatives are willing to actively participate in the creation and maintenance of a long-lasting cooperation platform. We hope, that the second batch of the Boot Camp will also motivate participants from Armenia and Georgia, to create long-lasting cooperation, which will serve as the basis for the sustainable development in the region”, – said Irina Guruli, Deputy Director at the Economic Policy Research Center.
After concluding the three-day Boot Camp, the participants from the Georgian non-governmental organizations will host project participants from Armenia in their organizations.
The project ACTION aims at strengthening civil society representatives from the South Caucasus countries on the issues of media communication and democracy, through establishing a platform of exchange between Georgian-Azerbaijani and Georgian-Armenian civil society actors for long-term collaboration and information exchange.
