Between the 17-21 of September, the Federation of Young European Greens, together with over 100 other youth organisations from 34 countries, participated in the Launching Meeting of the Euro-Med Youth Platform.
YEG feels proud that the first director of the Platform is our former Treasurer, Giovanni Buttigieg. Between 1996-1997 Giovanni has also served our organisation as the coordinator of the Network of Mediterranean Ecologists (Resaux JEM) an initiative of FYEG.
The Euro-Med Youth Platform aims at bringing young people from the region together in an environment of tolerance and mutual understanding, facilitating networking between them, assisting in the capacity building of youth organisations, increasing youth participation, sharing of relevant information, and exchanging good practice.
Its objectives are the nurturing of democracy and its established instruments, and fostering mutual understanding as well as improvement in the issues of racism, gender equality and minority rights.
Apart from the Launching Meeting, the tasks for the first year of operation of the Platform are setting up a functional secretariat, creating a database of youth organizations in Europe and the Mediterranean, support the Euro-Mediterranean Youth Programme, publish a magazine, organize a sub-regional meeting, and conduct a survey on what needs of young people and youth organisations can be addresses by the Platform.
Over 800 youth organisations have already joined the Platform. A data-base with information on each is available on the Platform’s web-site. This is an easy-to-use and a very practical tool in looking for partners in the Mediterranean and Europe for our projects. Any group interested in working with young people can join the Platform through a simple form on its web-site.
The Euro-Med Youth Platform is an instrument being developed within the framework of cooperation in the youth sector between twentyseven countries parties to the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership Agreement, more commonly referred to as the Barcelona Declaration. These are Algeria, Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Luxembourg, Malta, Morocco, Netherlands, Palestine, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, and the United Kingdom.
As from May next year, the Check Republic, Estonia, Hungary Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia will be formally joining this process. However, youth groups in these countries can already join the Platform, and have in fact taken part in the Launching Meeting.