Training: “Cooperation of non-profit non-governmental organisations and government in the Czech Republic. Development of public policies and dialogue. Lessons learned from the operation of the incubators facility”

On 27-31 August 2018, a training on “Cooperation of Non-Profit Non-Governmental Organisations and Government in the Czech Republic” will be conducted in Aghveran by Czech experts from the project partner “Agora Central Europe” NGO in the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project.

The “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project is implemented with the financial support of the European Union by a consortium of civil society organizations, which are the “Armenian Lawyers’ Association” NGO, Agora Central Europe o.p.s (an NGO from the Czech Republic), the “Armenian Center for Democratic Education-CIVITAS” NGO, the “International Center for Human Development” Public Organization, the “SME Cooperation Association” NGO and the Union of Communities of Armenia.

The project was launched on 15 December 2016. Project duration is 34 months. The total budget of the project is EUR 2.222.256 million of which the EU contribution is EUR 2.000.000. The project has 9 target sectors. The overall objective of the project is to enhance the influence of CSOs on the public policy process, and the specific objectives are to strengthen the ability of CSOs to build coalitions and focus on constructive and strategic policy engagement with local and central government partners.

The 9 project target sectors are:

1. Public finance management,

2. Human rights,

3. Justice,

4. Business,

5. Education,

6. Agriculture,

7. Economy,

8. Energy,

9. Social sector: social inclusion of children with disabilities.

In the scope of the project CSOs working in 9 target sectors of the project will be trained in the following areas: conducting monitoring of public budget allocations and policy implementation; identification of the most important issues for the development of public policies; analysis and development of public policies to solve these issues; building coalitions and focusing on constructive and strategic policy engagement with local and central government partners.

In addition, CSO incubators will be established at strategic locations in the marzes. The incubators will focus on strengthening CSOs’ abilities in monitoring and policy-making.

Further, the issues existing in 9 different areas will be jointly raised by the authorized state bodies and civil society organisations. Public policies aimed at solving the identified problems will be developed in CSO-Government dialogue format.