The EU-funded “Examples of SHEvalry and SHEroism” campaign, dedicated to renowned women from Montenegrin and EU history, officially began with a panel discussion at the Ribnica Cultural Centre. The panel was attended by women who continue to smash stereotypes and achieve their dreams.
The panel included the Ambassador of the EU to Montenegro, Oana Cristina Popa; the only female pilot in the Army of Montenegro, Kristina Bačić; the first Montenegrin at the US West Point Military Academy, Nevena Nikolić; and the only female competitor in mountain speed races, Anđela Knežević. The panel was moderated by journalist Aleksandra Šljivić.
Opening the panel, Ambassador Popa noted that this EU campaign pays tribute to heroines who, through their achievements, overcame obstacles and broke stereotypes, paving the way for generations of women in the fight for gender equality and their rights. “We want this campaign to inspire Montenegrin girls. We want them to get to know women who changed Montenegro, Europe and the world by living ahead of their time and not taking no for an answer. We want young girls to hear this message: be brave, strong and daring and do everything you can to fulfil your dreams,” Popa said.
The campaign will last until the end of the month.
For this year’s Women’s Day on 8 March, WeBalkans and the Young European Ambassadors joined forces to promote the #BreakTheBias campaign (https://www.internationalwomensday.com/). They did this through reels and other social media content and street actions across the Western Balkans including in Banja Luka, Belgrade, Kumanovo, Niš, Novi Sad, Podgorica, Pristina, Sarajevo, Skopje, and Tirana.
Activities aimed to break the bias of gender stereotypes. #BreakTheBias is all about empowering women and enhancing their role in society and freedom to determine who they are and what they want to become.
The WeBalkans Young European Ambassadors (YEA) network was launched in August 2020 by a regional communication programme for the Western Balkans, represented by the European Commission Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations (DG NEAR), as a creative network of future young game-changers from across the Western Balkans (Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia). These 120 visionary young people are interested in learning about EU values and promoting the opportunities that the EU offers, but are also eager to advocate for topics such as gender equality, intercultural learning, environment protection and human rights, and to share joint regional youth initiatives.
The Route WB6 Volunteer Caravan is on its way! This unique creative caravan is made up of 40 Young European Ambassadors, Route WB6 volunteers and young journalists from the Hajde platform from all over the Western Balkans. As part of the final stage of the Route WB6 project, promoting youth mobility, volunteering and peacebuilding in the region, the caravan aims to promote regional volunteer exchanges and youth volunteering across the region. The Volunteer Caravan on wheels is touring eight different towns in the region for a week where young volunteers engage with local partners in activities like environmental protection actions, restorations, creative workshops with children, meetups, and youth councils. The activity is being implemented in cooperation with the Young European Ambassadors network.
The starting point of this journey was Podgorica on 9 March and the final destination is Tirana on 15 March. On the way, the volunteers will have the chance to visit Mostar, Sarajevo, Kopaonik, Pristina and Bitola, while socialising with their peers and contributing to local communities.
One of the Young European Ambassadors involved in the Route WB6 Volunteer Caravan said “As YEAs, we have travelled through the Western Balkans for study trips, environmental issues, socialising, debating, singing and dancing at festivals. I am very excited that this time we will join the Route WB6 Volunteer Caravan. We are all heading to the same destination: a region embracing European values. So let’s join together in this caravan, sharing the path that leads to reconciliation and stability and a common European future for the region.”
The European Training Foundation (ETF) has launched a call for examples of the importance of skills in empowering the green transition. The call, entitled “Green transition: education, training and skills” aims to collect stories about how education, training and skills development is supporting the shift towards sustainable, clean, carbon-neutral circular economies and societies.
The aim is to provide ideas and inspiration for education and training policy-makers and practitioners in the EU neighbourhood and beyond.
The successful finalists will receive the ETF Skills for the Green Transition award which will be presented at the 2022 European Vocational Skills Week organised by the European Commission. The top stories will be showcased in ETF publications and communications and the ETF will produce short films of the most interesting stories, some of which will be shown at the 2022 European Vocational Skills Week and promoted on ETF social media channels.
The ERGO network has launched a call for the most “Roma-Friendly Mayor” as part of the “Romani Women Power of Change in the Western Balkans and Turkey” project, implemented jointly by Roma Active Albania and the ERGO Network. The call is part of a wider campaign that aims to increase awareness of – and change attitudes towards – Roma inclusion, and contribute to overcoming the many barriers.
The award-winning mayors from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Serbia, and Turkey will participate in a special event in Brussels as part of Roma Week between 16 and 19 May, to meet a high representative from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement (DG NEAR).
The competition will be open until 15 April and an independent jury will be established in each country to select the winner of the contest based on set criteria. Romani Women Power of Change in the Western Balkans and Turkey project partners will carry out local information sessions to further brief interested municipalities on the campaign and competition.
The campaign and the competition are funded by the European Union.
A new taskforce will gather and analyse material to help understand disinformation trends relating to the war in Ukraine. The taskforce will focus on disinformation in EU and EEA countries, as well as the Western Balkans, collecting and sorting relevant material such as fact-checking, investigations, rapid analysis, and research on disinformation campaigns, as well as media literacy initiatives. The taskforce also aims to identify the datasets needed to understand disinformation campaigns.
The European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) has already published a regularly updated list of online material with disinformation regarding the war. Such collections can inform policymakers, including the European Commission, to help understand the phenomenon of disinformation and contribute to an evidence-based decision-making process on the war in Ukraine.
The taskforce members will collaborate with national and regional EDMO hubs, small-scale online media projects and other relevant actors across Europe.
With EU funding, a start-up offers digital legal services.
How did the pandemic change your world? Many experts have argued that humans are prone to come up with new solutions to problems when they are thrown out of their routine and have time to work and develop an idea. This kind of innovation is exactly what happened with the start-up founded by Kristiana Filip, a young woman from Albania. Her idea to set up an online legal service was born during lockdown and has been developing ever since.
“I came to realise that many legal services can be automated, but that this service did not exist in Albania. During lockdown, I had time to think and come up with ideas on how to fix this problem.”
Efficient support to entrepreneurs comes through automation
As a young lawyer who had studied corporate law in Albania and abroad, Kristiana was growing frustrated by spending time on simple legal services that kept her focus away from more important issues.
“I came to realise that many legal services can be automated, but that this service did not exist in Albania. During lockdown, I had time to think and come up with ideas on how to fix this problem,” she says.
Legit, the start-up Kristiana founded, is a digital platform that aims to provide high-quality, fast and easily accessible legal services for Albanian entrepreneurs. The platform enables the creation of legal documents such as an employment contract, an authorisation, or a property lease. Users are asked to respond to a short questionnaire and then their personalised legal document is ready in just a few minutes. The other key feature of the platform is its matchmaking function for contracting legal professionals.
“Legit’s digital services are unique in Albania and, I believe, in the whole Western Balkans region.” Kristiana says with enthusiasm of her approach that is based on western market models. From the start, she has also targeted the Kosovo market, where there are similar laws and Albanian spoken as a primary language.
Kristiana’s platform also has a section dedicated to informing young entrepreneurs and founders about incubation, acceleration and funding opportunities, and legal guidance is provided in Legit’s blog posts.
“The EU support is really welcome since it fills a gap left by the market and the institutions who are yet to put in place a special fund for start-ups.”
About the project
EU for Innovation seeks to improve the innovative ecosystem and boost the creation of start-ups in Albania through capacity development for innovation among innovation ecosystem actors; building connections within the Albanian innovation ecosystem; and funding for innovative start-ups and innovation support providers.
Start-ups like Legit have benefited from the Challenge Fund, a competitive financing facility used as a means of addressing the issue of access to finance for innovative companies at an early stage of development, as well as for organisations engaged in services to innovative start-ups and promotion of the Albanian innovation system.
Go for what you believe in
Born as an idea during lockdown, Legit has progressed to now being ready for launch. The process of setting up the business was not easy, and Kristiana has published all the challenges in an eBook to set out all the legal elements required. A grant through the EU for Innovation initiative in 2021, provided capacity development and the technical expertise to develop and promote the platform in March 2022.
“The EU support is really welcome since it fills a gap left by the market and the institutions who are yet to put in place a special fund for start-ups,” explains Kristiana.
She sees the need for continuous work to improve unmet legal needs more effectively so her learning and ideas for improving the Legit platform do not end here. The start-up aims to grow together with experts who will develop its products further. Kristiana says that she is inclined to invite women to join her in the start-up journey, despite her acknowledgement that she grew as a lawyer and entrepreneur by learning mostly from men.
Kristiana’s advice for young women who want to engage in business or further develop their careers: “Just go for what you believe in! #NoRegrets.”
In his address, European Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Olivér Várhelyi outlined theEuropean Union’s plans to increase economic support to the region to €30 billion in the coming years. Implemented in partnership with institutional and private investors, the financing aims to speed up the region’s social and economic convergence with the EU and is expected to boost its gross domestic product by 3.6%.
“Europe does not end at Zagreb or Budapest,” Mr Várhelyi said. “The Western Balkans naturally belong here too.”
In their speeches and answers to investors’ questions, the heads of government summarised their investment priorities. All leaders spoke of plans to develop renewable energy sources, which require a regional energy system to balance the inflow of renewables into national grids and, in some countries, a change of legislation to enable large-scale private investment.
Today’s event was the fifth EBRD summit of its kind. The inaugural Western Balkans Summit which brought together all the region’s prime ministers for the first time, took place at EBRD headquarters in London in February 2014.
This brochure presents an overview of the 21 projects endorsed by the European Commission in February 2022 to support transport, digital, climate and energy connectivity and health infrastructure projects in the Western Balkans. This is the first major package of project unveiled under the EU’s Economic and Investment Plan for the region, and will be channelled through the Western Balkans Investment Framework (WBIF) platform.
This factsheet provides a summary of the €3.2 billion investment package endorsed by the European Commission in February 2022 to support 21 projects in the Western Balkans. This is the first major package of project unveiled under the EU’s Economic and Investment Plan for the region.
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