Author: WeBalkans

Open call for journalists to participate in media trips in 2023/24

Written by WeBalkans on 03 Feb 2023. Posted in News.

The Pulse of Europe – Media Trips to EU project has issued a new Call for Proposals for journalists to participate in media trips that will be organised during 2023 and the first half of 2024. The call will be open throughout that period.

As in the previous cycle of project implementation, the invitation is open to all media in Serbia – national, regional and local, electronic, print and online media – with the condition of compliance with the Code of Ethics (Code of Journalists of Serbia) and respect of professional and ethical standards.

The project organises group-thematic media trips that include a more significant number of media, as well as individual trips where a journalist travels alone, with the logistical support of the project. Group media trips will be organised to EU member states, the Western Balkans countries, and countries of the Eastern Partnership (Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine) and Great Britain.

The project is financed by the European Union and implemented by the Goethe-Institut in cooperation with the Independent Journalists Association of Serbia and the Center for Cultural Decontamination.

Mito-Fert-Signature – Safe and cost-effective diagnostic tool to asses men (in/sub) fertility

Written by WeBalkans on 30 Jan 2023. Posted in Stories.

An EU funded project supports scientists in Serbia on making available their innovation to local and international market.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), infertility is a global public health issue and it is increasing for 10% every year. The overall burden of subfertility/infertility is significant, likely underestimated, and has not displayed any decrease over the last 20 years. According to WHO the increasing number of unexplained cases of infertile males in the peak of the reproductive period, and a decrease of the fertility rate in men younger than age 30, suggest an urgent need for accurate diagnostic. A team of scientists from University of Novi Sad Mito-REBELS (https://mito-rebels.pmf.uns.ac.rs/mito-rebels-engl/; https://expo2020.pks.rs/mito-rebels/ ) have found a feasible solution for this addressing this worldwide issue.

“So, through this project we came up with a totally new approach in assessment of infertility or subfertility in males.”

Professor Silvana Andric is a lecturer at the University of Novi Sad, Faculty of Sciences. She is a PhD in male reproductive endocrinology and post-doctoral training in cell signalling related to reproductive endocrinology. Finally, Professor Andric has 30 years of experience in research related to male reproductive biology and 20 years of experience in teaching different courses related to reproductive biology and cell signalling. Years ago, together with Mito-REBELS team (https://mito-rebels.pmf.uns.ac.rs/mito-rebels-engl) she embarked on an ambitious task of offering solution to the increasing global problem of male infertility and they came up with a innovative solution that is based on the relation of mitochondria and sperm functionality . Professor Andric explains that the close relationship between mitochondria and sperm functionality was clear, but unfortunately was not exploited in clinical practice. Therefore, they worked on this proposal which is based on research initially on animal models and later on human samples where they learned that have good results on regular testing procedures, but are infertile. “So, through this project we came up with a totally new approach in assessment of infertility or subfertility in males,” says Professor Andric.

Elaborating further on the topic, Professor Andric further explains that their invention is based on molecular approach, a technology based on Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test which is regularly used in diagnostic (also for the SaRS-Cov2). Therefore, they don’t need to establish new technology in order to start the implementation of the solution.

“The support that we got from the EU4TECH project was crucial, enormous and extremely important.”

About the project

EU4TECH PoC Western Balkans was a two-year multi-country Instrument for Pre-Accession (IPA) project funded by the EU through the Western Balkans Enterprise and Development Innovation Facility (WBEDIF). The project covered the six economies of the Western Balkans region. Projects supported originated from public research organisations and start-ups/ small and medium-sized enterprises.

WBEDIF is one of the private sector instruments supported by the Western Balkans Investment Framework – a joint initiative of the EU, financial organisations, bilateral donors and beneficiaries, aimed at enhancing harmonisation and cooperation in investments for the socio-economic development of the region and contributing to the European perspective of the Western Balkans.

The WBIF is the main vehicle for implementation of the EU’s ambitious Economic and Investment Plan for the Western Balkans. Enhancing the competitiveness of the private sector, and stepping up support to research and innovation is at the heart of the Plan.

Despite the scientific success, professor and her team had to do an additional work in order to bring this innovation to life, work that was out of their professional scope. This included market strategy, trade mark related and prototyping related documents and similar. On this they got a support from and EU funded EU4TECH project and great people (dr Lisa Cowey, dr Davorka Forjan, dr Krzysztof Gulda, etc). Thanks to this support, now professor Andric and her team will be able to acquire additional funding or investors for the project, initiate a start-up or in some other way place the product in the market. “The support that we got from the EU4 TECH project was crucial, enormous and extremely important,” says professor Andric.

The invention is planned to be offered to the market sometime next year. Professor Andric says that she is interested to keep this invention as part of the University by creating a sort of spin off that would give an opportunity to Mito-REBELS team and most importantly to the students to grow bigger and sign off also other important inventions.

EU and EBRD support renovation wave in Serbia

Written by WeBalkans on 27 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

The European Union and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) are helping Serbia to improve the energy efficiency of its public buildings with a €14 million financial package.

The package, which includes a €12 million EBRD loan and a €2 million grant from the EU, will help finance energy efficient retrofit measures in 80 public buildings, including education, healthcare, administrative, sports and cultural buildings, across 20 municipalities in Vojvodina. These buildings will be renovated with thermal insulation, new windows, upgraded heating, ventilation and cooling systems, and energy efficient lighting.

The improvements are expected to contribute to primary energy reduction of 53 per cent and annual CO₂ emission reductions of 56 per cent.

In addition to €2 million grant from the EU, the project also benefits from close to €2 million grants for technical cooperation, provided by Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) and Italy through Central European Initiative (CEI).

Buildings account for around 34 per cent of energy consumption in Serbia. Renovations can help lower consumption and CO₂ emissions, but significant effort is needed to stimulate and prioritise these investments, especially in the multi-apartment residential sector.

BIRN Publishes 2022 Report on Handling of Workers’ Rights Cases in Kosovo by Courts and Labour Inspectorate

Written by WeBalkans on 27 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

The 2022 report found that almost one person dies in the workplace in Kosovo every month on average, while only 1.5 per cent of businesses have fulfilled their obligation to assess the risks at the workplace. Although there are no exact statistics on the number of unregistered workers in Kosovo, Labour Inspectorate data show that during 2021 alone, 1,459 employees were found to be working without employment contracts while 433 employees were not declared at the Tax Administration of Kosovo, TAK.

The findings of the report were discussed with two panels, including different actors from public institutions. At a a conference “Handling of Workers’ Rights Cases by the Labour Inspectorate and the Judiciary”.

This activity was implemented as part of the project “Protecting and Promoting Labour Rights of Vulnerable Groups in the Labour Market”, funded by the European Office in Kosovo and implemented by BIRN Kosovo in partnership with Advocacy Training and Resource Center ATRC.

Meet the 17 Selected Superschools of Albania

Written by WeBalkans on 27 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

The Regional Youth Cooperation Office (RYCO) in cooperation with Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) organized the introductory event “Meet the Superschools of Albania” in Tirana on January 25th, 2023 in the framework of the Superschools Exchange Programme. The meeting gathered the 17 awarded high schools from Albania represented by their principals and teachers in charge of coordinating the upcoming regional exchanges not only to get to meet with each other but also to be part of a significant momentum such as the signing of the Partnership Agreements.

The activity was participated by Mrs. Evis Kushi, Minister of Education and Sports, H. E. Christiane Hohmann, Ambassador of the European Union in Albania, Mr. Martin Karl Zickendraht, First Secretary in Charge of the Culture and Press Section at the German Embassy, and Mrs. Alba Brojka, Head of the Local Branch Office of RYCO in Albania.

Ambassador Christiane Hohmann stated that the European Union is very proud to support this project. “We are very happy that there will be more and more Superschools in the region. We see this project as part of our wider objective to support youth engagement, and regional cooperation and reconciliation. The EU will continue to place young people and children at the center of our cooperation with the Western Balkans.” – reinforced further the ambassador.

The implementation of the projects will be divided into two rounds: The first round of exchanges will happen from April to June 2023 and the second round will continue from August to October 2023. Each partner school will organize one exchange visit to the partnering one lasting up to 7 days with a group of up to 12 students and 1 to 2 teachers. Through the exchange scheme, students and teachers will have the chance to travel, present themselves, their schools, and customs to their hosts, and learn new things about local communities all throughout the region.

The EU and Germany help improve waste management in Kosovo; invest additional EUR 49 million in the sector

Written by WeBalkans on 27 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

The EU in Kosovo, in collaboration with the German Embassy, GIZ, Ministry of Environment, and the Association of Kosovo Municipalities, marked on 25 January the completion of a three-year-long project dedicated to the improvement of the solid-waste management in Kosovo and presented the newly launched activities in the sector.

The recently finalised project worth EUR 7 million was jointly funded by the European Union and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and implemented by GIZ. It led to an increase in the collection of solid waste in all 38 Kosovo municipalities from 57.8 to 90.2 per cent, an extension of waste-collection and management service to additional 77,000 households, and the closure of more than 1,500 illegal dumpsites.

The EU and the German Government are continuing to support sustainable reforms in the waste management sector in Kosovo.

EU agrees 24 new guarantee programmes to boost investments in enlargement and neighbourhood regions

Written by WeBalkans on 27 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

The Operational Board of the European Fund for Sustainable Development plus (EFSD+) has today endorsed a further package of 24 guarantee programmes to support investments in the EU’s neighbourhood and enlargement countries. Together with the three guarantees for the Western Balkans to support SMEs approved in December, the new guarantees, worth €2.4 billion, are expected to generate investments in the order of €17 billion in priority sectors, including renewable energy, digital connectivity and private sector competitiveness, under the Economic and Investment Plans (EIPs), which are the vehicles to deliver on Global Gateway in the Western Balkans and South and Eastern Neighbourhood.

The EFSD+, the financial arm under the EU’s Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument (NDICI) – Global Europe, provides guarantees to mitigate the risk for investments aligned with EU priorities in our partner countries.

European and international financial institutions, such as the European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), and EU national development banks, will work jointly with the European Commission to originate investment opportunities, aligned with the Economic and Investment Plan flagships and that are expected to crowd-in private investors.

Once the guarantee agreements are signed between the EU and a total of 11 European and International Financial Institutions such as the EIB, the EBRD and national development banks, these entities will have three years to generate investments in areas like: the competitiveness of the private sector and the innovation agenda for the Western Balkans; the Black Sea connectivity in the Eastern Neighbourhood; the energy transition and security in the Southern Neighbourhood. The EU guarantee is also expected to increase banks’ finance for small and medium enterprises, as well as to increase the issuance of green bonds in the EU partner countries.

Media and Information Literacy Workshops by YEAs start in the Western Balkans!

Written by WeBalkans on 26 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

Do you know how the news is created? How can you tell truth from misinformation? Why do we need media literacy? What are the most reliable sources of news? Why do some news stories go viral? Join us to find out!

After the intensive learning process on Media and Information Literacy, Young European Ambassadors from Western Balkans are starting their journey around the Western Balkans, sharing their knowledge with young people interested in media, social media, and society, always eager to learn more about the world around us.

If you are:

-interested in the topic of Media and Information Literacy

-13 – 16 years old

-coming from the Western Balkans

then JOIN US on our journey!!

You will be given an opportunity to meet our YEAs but also learn about:

-media and media literacy

-fake news

-clickbait

-journalism

-media manipulation

-and much more…

through fun exercises, lots of discussion, videos and examples.

All of the workshops will be conducted in local languages. You will also have the opportunity to get to know about Young European Ambassadors and to get some YEA gifts from our team!

The exact times and dates for the workshops in Western Balkans will be announced on our channels soon!

The maximum number of participants per workshop is 25, so be ready to check info about dates and venues regularly, in order to secure your spot on time by filling in this registration FORM.

By filling in this form, you are securing your spot and we will contact you directly regarding the date and place of the workshop nearest to you!

Changing your outfit

Written by WeBalkans on 25 Jan 2023. Posted in Stories.

An EU-funded project provides financial and technical assistance to textile companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Textile companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina faced numerous challenges during the pandemic. Orders and sales significantly dropped, and supply chains were disrupted, making the purchase of raw materials very difficult from early February 2020. The industry estimates that every third job lost in the country during the pandemic occurred in the textile sector. One of the companies facing these challenges was a clothing company with a long history: Sana Linea from Kostajnica, in the north of BiH. Established in 1947, the company currently employs 74 workers and is an entirely women-led business. They have 13 retail stores across Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as two in Serbia.

“We were working on the development of a new collection. As everyone knows, the pandemic created major problems in the procurement of materials and delivery problems. In our case, one of the problems was also the financing of certain special machines in a higher price range, and we needed them for the necessary modernisation of our production line.”

Marijana Bučevac is the CEO of Sana Linea. She explains that the company was doing well before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic when they were planning expansion of their product line and the number of employees. However, the pandemic brought a halt to this development and jeopardised even the existing operational performance of the company. “We were working on the development of a new collection. As everyone knows, the pandemic created major problems in the procurement of materials and delivery . In our case, one of the problems was also the financing of certain special machines in a higher price range, and we needed them for the necessary modernisation of our production line,” says Marijana.

Just at that time, they saw an announcement by the EU-funded EU4BusinessRecovery project and they applied. The support from the project came at the right time, and the European Union supported them with the purchase of special machines for the production, and with the procurement of raw materials. The project also contributed to a healthier environment for employees, with a partial reconstruction of the factory. Marijana describes one of the other important investments being the development of a mobile application for iOS and Android platforms that allowed them to improve online sales and reach a larger number of customers.

“Through this support, we managed to modernise our production by purchasing special machinery, and hired 10 new workers. We also developed our web shop and webpage so we can reach out to new customers. We have started exporting to the EU.”

About the project

The EU-funded “COVID-19 Investment Response – EU4 Business Recovery” project is implemented by the International Labour Organisation, in partnership with the German development agency GIZ and the United Nations Development Programme. The aim of the project is to support the recovery of the BiH economy from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The specific objective is to provide emergency support to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises to ensure their business continuity, retain more than 1,000 jobs, and create at least 100 new jobs, especially supporting women entrepreneurs, young people and other vulnerable groups.

Today, the company is working on strengthening its brand even more and expanding its sales to countries outside Bosnia and Herzegovina. By constantly monitoring changes in the market, the company is operating successfully for now.

Marijana explains that the investment in machinery and marketing contributed to increases in their sales. “Through this support, we managed to modernise our production by purchasing special machinery, and hired 10 new workers. We also developed our web shop and webpage so we can reach out to new customers. We have started exporting to the EU,” she Marijana.

RCC launches a campaign to encourage young women and girls across the Western Balkans to choose careers in STEM

Written by WeBalkans on 23 Jan 2023. Posted in News.

To encourage young women and girls to pursue careers in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and maths), the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) has launched a campaign called “Choose STEM Future”. The campaign presents role models of successful women in STEM professions from the Western Balkans and was created as part of the regional Women in STEM Network, a joint initiative of the RCC and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

“65% of today’s children will one day work in a job that does yet not exist. By 2030, between 40 and 160 million women will need to have transitioned into roles requiring more complex digital, social, and emotional skills. Globally, in cutting-edge fields such as artificial intelligence, only one in five professionals is a woman. Growing and adapting our own skills and being up to date with new technologies is incredibly important for youngsters – women in particular – and so is staying creative and open-minded, as their future job might not exist just yet. So, if you want to have better job choices, to earn more and live better, like Anica, Anila, Jana, Jasminka, Valentina, and Zana, whom you’ll meet in the stories we’ll share with you in the coming days, Choose STEM Future. That is the best advice I can give you,” said RCC Secretary General Majlinda Bregu announcing the start of the “Choose STEM future” campaign.