Introduction In the last year, despite the reduction in budget following the EU election campaign, FYEG has been active across a wide range of political, organisational and networking projects. The new low-budget situation, without an election campaign as the automatic centre-focus of FYEG s activities, has brought to the centre the importance of a strategic approach. We need to be able to do more with less, and be effective at what we do, rather than aim high without being clear on what we can achieve or how we can do it. For the upcoming year, the outgoing EC propose to continue to improve three key pillars of FYEG: 1. Political campaigning: Climate change will continue to be a cornerstone of FYEG s activity in the first half of the mandate, with the ongoing climate campaign and monitoring of the UN climate change summit. In the second half of the mandate will focus on the topic of re-distribution and campaign for more equality in Europe between the societies and within the societies. We will bring forward the importance of a cohesive Europe at a time when we are seeing increased political and economic division. Other topics that will be worked with include migration - and the need to move away from the Fortress Europe situation we are heading to - and continuing to raise awareness around TTIP, which has now entered the mainstream political discussion in many EU member states. 2. Empowering and networking The FYEG could not exist without its core component, its Member Organisations. In order for the FYEG to be stronger and to have a greater political impacts, our MOs need to be strong as well. Both the FYEG and its MOs have developed through the years several experiences such as running political campaigns, organising international events, communicating with stakeholders Even though there is a high level of interaction between the FYEG and its members, which we have tried to develop over the past year, it is far from enough and there is still plenty to improve. That is why we want to improve the Twinning Cities Project, which is a good opportunity for the FYEG to get closer to its local activists and to organise capacitybuilding activities, and for the local activists to strengthen their actions and structures by learning from other young greens and from the FYEG. We also want to launch a new platform where every young green activists will be able to raise issues to the European community and to the decision-makers. We want to offer a new space where our MOs can express themselves and be heard. Lastly, we want to establish a more participatory approach and including MO input into more of FYEG s operation. Regular skype conferences will be set up with all the spoke-people in order to strengthen our network.
3. Policy development We will continue to shape the voice of the European Green Youth. The Greens are still the closest European political family and this is especially the case in the Youth. We will be addressing some of the issues that have historically divided us, such as the Israel-Palestine conflict through the continuation of the Olive Tree Branch project, and will incorporate new issues we have not dealt with in detail in the past, such as sex education. Summary of activities: 1. Climate change 1.1Climate campaign 1.2 Alter-COP seminar 2. Grassroots involvement 2.1 Twinning cities 2.2 Politicising the personal 3. Olive Tree Branch 4. Strategic development 4.1 Political approach 4.2 Organisational approach 4.3 Partnerships 5. Working groups 1. Climate change: en route to Paris Europe is hosting the COP21 at the end of 2015 and FYEG is going to be there, physically and politically. Ahead of and during the talks, we will be carrying out political advocacy, highlighting positive solutions and raising awareness of the obstacles, both externally through the climate campaign and internally with the altercop seminar: 1.1 Climate campaign (see annex1 campaign plan ) 1.2 Alter-COP seminar In order to monitor the progress of the COP summit, we will run a seminar in parallel with the Summit in Paris. This will include training on the UNFCCC process and how it works (or does not work) an update from the COP delegation, with an insider view into any developments an action as part of the closing of the climate campaign. capacity building to allow participants to share on their skills amongst their own organisations
2. Reaching to the Grassroots It s really time to focus on our key resource: our people. We are lucky to be part of a federation including over 30 organisations and thousands of grassroots members. We are keen to prove that Green solutions cross national borders, and increase involvement of members that don t automatically see themselves in the European sphere. 2.1 Twinning Cities: Think global, act local In May 2015, this project has 6 partnerships which are at the very beginning of their twinning project and has included so far around 35 local groups from 16 MOs. Most of the twin groups have been created thanks to the Twinning Cities project. We organized a first successful meeting in December 2014 when we involved local activists to the building of the project so that it s a real participatory project. Many motivated people made it a success. After a really good start, Twinning Cities now needs to go further. We plan: To keep working on guidelines about how to build a sustainable twinning between 2 local groups of young greens. And to keep supporting the ongoing twinning projects so that they manage to realize their action plan. To try including volunteers who could be godparents of some twinning projects. To organize a Twinning Cities Camp in October in Sweden. It is thought as a kickoff event in order to officially launch the first twinning. To develop cooperations between the FYEG and local stakeholders. At the end of the mandate, we aim at supporting the implementation of some twinning projects, at writing complete and detailed twinning cities guidelines and at making the Twinning Cities camp a regular event. 2.2 Politicising the personal This proposal for a platform, which is currently in consultation with MEPs, aims to provide a tool to allow Young Greens throughout Europe to share their struggles, learn from each other across borders and make their voice heard at the decisionmaking level. (please see project summary in the Annex2) Internal discussion and learning 3. Olive Tree Branch: the Israel-Palestine conflict (see activity plan in annex3) We will continue the mandate of previous GA, continuing to run the online discussions between members of MOs and finalising in a seminar in Brussels where the outcomes of the overall process can be discussed. Different options for funding a study visit to the area will be evaluated and put forward to the MOs, although the main focus will be on the successful conclusion of the discussions and maximising the inclusion of MOs in the process.
4. Strategic development We will ensure that FYEG also looks at the long term and improves as an organisation. 4.1 More outward - political organisation The larger and more geographically dispersed an organisation is, the easier it becomes to get trapped in process and internal discussion. We need to ensure to keep the wider perspective in mind, reaching both our grassroots and the outer world, making the case for the Young Green perspective. Although there has been a conscious move in this direction over the second half of the last mandate, there is plenty left to do. 4.1.1 Spokespeople should speak! In past Executive Committees the Spokesperson were tasked with many issues, including both the political and organisational leadership of the organisation. In the coming year, the Spokespeople should put a strong focus on outside communication. The Spokespeople should specially: Liaise with the Press-Department of the EGP and the Group to develop a plan on how to be more present in European and National media Liaise with Spokespeople of MOs in order to write common articles and opinion pieces for national medial Strive for publishing at least one article or statement per month and also triggering debate on political content within and between Member Organisations The Spokespeople are also responsible for social media activities. They will take care that FYEG is regularly present on different channels (at least 3 times per week on Facebook and once a day on twitter). The Erasmus+ intern is also tasked with supporting the Spokespeople on that issue. Furthermore, they will investigate whether other social media platforms should be a target for FYEG. 4.1.2 Campaigning In the first half of the mandate, the organisation will focus on the climate campaign - the cross-sectional nature of the topic means other issues (whether it is TTIP, food, migration or something entirely different) can be linked to the central issue of climate. In the second half of the term, we will focus on other issues and slow down the campaign work, focusing on triggering debate on specific issues, especially with regards to creating a Europe and a world based on equity, equality and justice. We propose that this is the topic of the Winter-Camp. The following content-wise topics should also be communicated within this topical framework. Migration In July we are conducting a Seminar on Migration in Malta. Aim of the seminar will be to develop policies and campaign ideas to end the killing of migrants in the mediterranean and get rid of deadly borders. The engagement of the Federation on
Migration issues needs to be strengthened, and we will encourage the Working Group on Migration to work closely with the MOs and with the responsible EC person to develop specific actions in the long run, involving all MOs to challenge borders and the Fortress Europe approach. We will build on the learning from the climate and EU election campaigns to ensure this is backed up by a good visual identity. TTIP-TiSA-CETA Within the coming year, there will be a considerable amount of advancement in the negotiations of these corporate trade agreements, which we consider would mean the end to many of our democratic rights. We want a different and fair globalisation. Therefore we will continue our campaigning on the issue. The existing Action Team should continue its work, with one member of the EC being responsible for it. We have already created a TTIP-Reader and strive to making a brochure out of it. We will continue giving educational webinars to our Member Organisation We will continue mobilising our network to take part in the Action Days against these corporate trade agreements Right-Wing Extremism and Right-Wing Populism After having had a successful conference on the topic of countering the Right-Wing, it is to be decided by the new EC, if they want to continue with a follow-up conference, specifically targeting MOs and MEPs and National Parties to develop a European approach to deal with the rise of the right wing as suggested by the past conference. However, a necessary follow-up project of the conference should be to bring to paper an alternative vision/imaginary of how we believe Europe should look like. This vision should specifically take into consideration the lessons learned from analysing populist movements. 4.2 A smarter, more effective organisation The proposed role of EC coordinator will work to ensure that the work of the different EC members and different parts of FYEG is coordinated, and that work is prioritised to match existing capabilities and still allow the federation to have a clear political role, being able to react to the political situation. 4.2.1 Member Organisations at the core Online MO conferences In 2014-2015 the spokespersons have successfully run two online MOconferences. In the next year, the MO-responsible within the EC and the Co- Spokespersons will run several such conferences for international officers. The aim of the conference is to keep the Member Organisations informed about the activities of FYEG; to consult the plans of FYEG with Member Organisations; to receive input from Member Organisations on future activities and to create networks between Member Organisations. The online Member Organisations conference should also be used by Member Organisations to ask for support, advice and inspiration from other Member Organisations on the challenges they are facing.
Member Organisations Meeting In the second half of the Year, the Member Organisations should have one in-person Meeting. The aim of the Meeting is to brainstorm with the MOs on the activity plan for the next year of FYEG. It should be an political-strategical exchange between Member Organisations on how FYEG can best cater for all MOs of all regions of Europe, what the future focus of the Organisation should be and on how the network itself can be strengthened. A second part of the meeting should focus on capacity exchange between Executives of MOs. MOs can teach each other on how to best campaign on the local level, on how best to organise the internal bureaucracy, on how to best have impact in the press for example. The EC will follow-up on this meeting with a concrete activity plan for the following mandate. Increased consultation In the last year, we have asked MOs for feedback on many different issues. We have asked for feedback on the Olive Tree Branch suggestions, the Climate Campaign, the amendments and resolutions of the European Green Party and political statements. We will continue to strive for being a very transparent, consultative and inclusive organisations and will continue using these methods to involve as many activist and Member Organisations as possible in our European Network. 4.2.2 Continuing to improve our Office capabilities Over the past year our office has continued to improve its processes, which is planned to continue over the next year. In addition, we are still lacking sufficient capacity in the office, therefore hiring an additional office staff is our main aim. This is particularly important to relieve some of the administrative work burden on the Sec-Gen, to allow her/him to focus more on managerial tasks and policy monitoring. With regards to improving processes, we have asked and will continue to consult experts within MOs or NGOs close to the Green project to, on a voluntary basis, peer-review and an assess the processes within the office with regards to efficiency, services to the Member Organisations and activists and political coordination. The result of this process should be to have concrete recommendations on how to improve the processes, so that FYEG becomes an even more effective organisation. After having had a good experience with hosting an Erasmus+ volunteer we will strive to make this a permanent solution for FYEG. We will actively search for such volunteers and also advocate on our website the possibility of conducting and Erasmus+ internship with FYEG, allowing us to have access to extra resources whilst offering motivated people the possiblity of collaborating with a European youth organisation. In addition, we will further investigate the possibility of hosting an European Voluntary Service-Volunteer at FYEG and come to a decision if we want this by the middle of the year. In order to get a more stable financial basis that would help us finance an additional office-staff, we will consider campaigning to receive more money The treasurer will
try to develop financial strategies in order to get more funding from our sources and from other sources and will take into account the structures of financial support from MOs. 4.2.3 A green Green Youth As a Green Youth, we need to try to make our events match our ideals. In this sense, we will work towards zero waste events and put in place a first procedure to report on the overall environmental impact of our events. We hope to be able to count on the support of volunteers form MOs and Working Groups for this purpose. 4.3 Being a good Partner European Green Party The European Green Party will continue to be a major Partner of our organisation. We will strive to work together with them in our campaigning on Climate Issues. We will strive for influencing their policies, including active participation in Committee Meetings and at the party s congresses, both with our own resolutions and amendments to other resolutions. For the election of the new Committee of the European Green Party, that will have a mandate of 4 years, we will strive for having one FYEG-related Member on that committee Greens in the European Parliament We have successfully concluded a frame-work agreement with the Greens/EFA Group in the European Parliament. It allows us to discuss common activities on the beginning of every year. We will continue the good work with the GGEP, focussing on ensuring the agreement is fully implemented and working on making the work of the Parliament more accessible to the grassroots. Green European Foundation Over a year, FYEG organized multiple educational activities in partnership with the Green European Foundation. As a result, FYEG is part of two projects: Climate has no borders, which is a follow up to previous collaboration; and a training for young journalists - Speak Up! - which is run by the Ecosprinter and Green European Foundation. We have maintained excellent professional relationship with the foundation and the Green European Journal are seeking regular interaction and opportunities to work together. The Ecosprinter Board is now part of the Correspondents meetings of the GEJ and we should aim at strengthening this partnership. CDN CDN and FYEG has expressed strong commitment to endorse already existing partnership further, realized through common activities and campaigns, increasing number of face-to-face meetings and comprehensive planning. GYG We will support GYG with the attempt to organise a GYG-summit.
FALAFEL This year the Federation has put efforts to bring a sustainable and efficient Falafel network, in coordinating and contacting all existing members of the yet-to-be-born network. The most important project coming up from this coordination is the Migration training that will take place in Malta from the 1st to the 8th of July, which includes in its program several sessions on networking and building up a sustainable network, as well as initiatives for follow up. This next year the objective is to organise and implement together with our Euro-Mediterranean partners one or more projects bringing together the Euro-Mediterranean youth on common issues (e.g. Migration, unemployment, democracy, Human Rights )