Local Activities – Live on the Island

During the practice phase and local actions envisaged by the project, the partner organizations and multipliers organized a series of initiatives, activities, meetings, seminars and workshops in the local communities of their islands. All activities proposed were planned and designed by the youth workers and partner operators based on the identified objectives and the target groups addressed.

The partners, given the peculiarities of their islands and communities, had different approaches to the implementation of the practical steps and initiatives, often responding to requests for interest generated in various contexts. Meetings were organised with formal and informal groups, often created on curiosity in the issues, or ecological practices involving young people, which led to the realisation of a higher than expected number of local initiatives and involvement of beneficiaries.

Among the main topics treated were: climate change impacts on island communities, climate change adaptation and resilience, impact of climate change on health, environment conservation and protection, waste management, pollution awareness, plastic pollution, cleaning actions, biodiversity, organic farming, farming and wellbeing, income generating activities and enterprise development, desalination and traditional bioclimatic architecture, religious aspects of environmental topics, networking for cooperation and developing initiatives on the island, cultural heritage, public spaces on the island, engagement with the local community, culture, and social activities, development of the island, sustainable tourism and thematic tourism, blue and green economy, tree planting, mangrove planting and restoration.

A total of 134 local activities were organized, involving a total of 5725 direct beneficiaries. Some of the actions were structured as workshops and events of a single meeting, with an average duration of 2/3 hours, others were designed and implemented according to a process comprising a whole day event or more work days.

Given also the specific activities and objectives of some of the partners within their islands, it can be seen that within the consortium the gender distribution of participants in local initiatives is mostly women. The age range most frequently reached is between 25 and 35 years old, but the activities still involve many younger and even older people. 90% of the participants in the local initiatives were islanders, with similar numbers from the urban and rural contexts of the islands.

Local activities involved additional stakeholders from each country and island and in many cases the project has also attracted the interest of local institutions. Were identified 75 between partner organizations, institutions and collaborating entities involved by the project action in the whole consortium.

It is estimated, through local actions and online activities that several indirect beneficiaries of approximately 22900 people were reached.

The visibility and promotion of the activities organized took place mainly through the Internet, but also through the organization of meetings, and events, the production of written documents and the support of the media and local partners.