Description
The project addresses the need for greater civil engagement with environment protection. The project aims at involving the local community by setting up an incubator for green ideas in Chiprovtsi Municipality. First, Eco Centre will be set up as an incubator for green ideas, trainings and volunteer initiatives. A visitor centre will be created with leaflets, interactive games, maps. Second, good experience and practices will be exchanged with the Croatian partner. Third, a public discussion on sustainable development will be held. Fourth, 2 initiatives on composting and cleaning-up illegally dumped litter from the area will be organized. A guide with the plant and animal species in Western Stara Planina Mountain will be published. Finally, several groups of students will take part in the school of nature. The project will benefit the local community, authorities, NGOs and businesses. The 2 partners will support with their expertise and coordination of the stakeholders.
Summary of project results
The project addressed the need for greater civil engagement with environment protection. Its main goal was to set up an eco centre that can attract young people in the region through the organization of various activities related to environment protection. The centre successfully started to work, managed to attract children and young people from other localities and started gaining recognition as a place for nature lovers. This set the beginning for raising the environmental awareness among the adolescents in the municipality through a combination of innovative methods of experiential learning. The children in the region discovered the place and started regarding it as a location for interesting ideas and activities related to environment protection targeted at children and young people. The experience exchanged with the Croatian partner created conditions for the development of this partnership in the future, given the fact that the feedback was highly positive. The project achieved another important result related to the involvement of citizens and NGOs in the decision-making process. The organized public discussion gave all the stakeholders the opportunity to voice their opinion. The community centre team was involved in the follow-up actions for the development of strategic documents of the municipality for environment protection. The foundations laid during the project implementation are a good departure point for the future development of the eco centre. The partnerships established with various organizations and groups of people will help continue the activities at the eco centre after the project end. The municipality adopted the decision to also use the equipped eco centre covered with children’s drawings as a tourist information centre and it has been successfully used for that purpose. The project partners of the U-planin project were Chiprovtsi Municipality which helped involve the public with the project activities and environment protection issues and Velebitska Udruga Kuterevo – VUK whose experts from Kuterevo provided their support and experience for the selection of methods, the formulation of a vision and goals and the deployment of experts to Chiprovtsi to join directly the project activities.
Summary of bilateral results