Issue: 36
This program will be funded by the Millennium Development Goals Achievement Fund (MDG-F) entrusted to United Nations by the Government of Spain and will be managed by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in cooperation with United Nations organizatons (UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNWTO). The Joint Program aims to promote culture tourism in Kars and the region of Eastern Anatolia.
Starting with the speech of Naif Alibeyoğlu, the Mayor of Kars, the event included speeches from Mehmet Ufuk Erden, the Governor of Kars, Mahmood Ayub, UN Resident Coordinator, Manuel Larrotcha, Deputy Chief of Mission of Embassy of Spain in Turkey, and İsmet Yılmaz, Undersecretary of Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
“This project is of great significance for Kars” stated Naif Alibeyoğlu, the Mayor of Kars. Mentioning that Kars was selected among 15 brand cities by the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism in its 2023 strategy, Mehmet Ufuk Erden, the Governor of Kars, pointed out that he was glad and excited that Kars was in this project. Mahmood Ayub in his speech accentuated the link between sustainable development and cultural and social diversity saying that culture could facilitate development through tourism. In addition to explicating Millenium Development Goals, Ayub added that this project would contribute to supporting pro-poor sectors in Kars. Manuel Larrotcha indicated that this project utilized an innovative approach in the sense that cultural heritage would contribute to poverty reduction. “This project can be a model.” Larrotcha said. Opening remarks came to an end by İsmet Yılmaz, Undersecretary of the Turkish Ministry of Tourism and Culture, who specified the 4 goals of the project: preparing the cultural heritage inventory of Kars, managing site areas, increasing awareness of Kars citizens on culture tourism and promoting culture tourism in Kars to the world. Yılmaz also thanked the Government of Spain and the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Toursim for their prominent support to the project.
After the opening remarks, officials from United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) made brief presentations about how each of them would contribute to Alliances for Culture Tourism in Eastern Anatolia UN Joint Program. UNDP programme associate Berna Beyazıt stated that UNDP would support clustering analyses and system of business development among other aspects of the project (for full speech please click here). “UNESCO contributes through capacity building and as a standard-setter and a clearing house.” said UNESCO official (for full speech please click here). As explained by Nilgün Çavuşoğlu, UNICEF official, tolerance, harmony and friendship among children, and common understanding among children on cultural diversity are the areas in which UNICEF will share its experience. She added that UNICEF would try to bring children’s perspective to the Project with children (for full speech please click here). UNWTO will add to the project by providing realistic assessment analysis, determining enterprise needs and strengthening visitors’ flow (for full speech please click here).
Following the presentations of UN agencies, working groups convened so as to share ideas on advantages and opportunities that the city of Kars has in culture tourism.
Alliances for Culture Tourism in Eastern Anatolia UN Joint Program, funded by the Government of Spain, will be managed by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in cooperation with United Nations organizatons (UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNWTO). The program, which aims to promote culture tourism in Kars and the region of Eastern Anatolia, is worth of 3.8 million US dollars and will be completed in December 2010.
Previously ruled by Sasanians, Romans, Byzantines and Ottomans among others, the city of Kars reflects many civilizations. As one of the culturally rich Eastern Anatolian cities, Kars is home to the Molokans as well, a community that was exiled from Russia in 1877. At the launch of Alliances for Culture Tourism in Eastern Anatolia UN Joint Program, an exhibition by Vedat Akçayöz presented photos from daily lives of Molokans. For more information on Molokans please click here.
The recent survey conducted by the Turkish Statistical Institute in cooperation with the Administration on Persons with Disabilities (ÖZİDA) indicates that there are approximately 8.5 million persons with disabilities in Turkey, which constitutes nearly 13% of the total population.
There is an urgent need to increase the integration of the disabled with their communities. Disabilities are often hidden by families and the disabled are kept apart from the social life. Thus, awareness on the subject among society and even in the family is fairly low. There is enormous need for awareness-raising, particularly in the relatively less developed parts of Turkey.
Recognizing the significance of the problem in Turkey; Ayder, Vodafone Turkey Foundation, UNDP and the Beşiktaş Municipality have materialized the “Dreams Academy” project to break social deprivation and ensure disabled individuals to be active and productive by using arts.
The project envisages to inspire and transform individuals that are physically, mentally, audioally, visually handicapped and also members from chronic illness and un-wealthy and disadvantaged youth groups. Art is one of the most important tools for the building up and evaluation of creative and productive individuals within society. As in many fields of social life, young disabled individuals have also been deprived of the arts.
As evident in the recent launching of the Dreams Academy which took place on November 2, 2008 at the Otto Santral on the Bilgi University, İstanbul campus, there is a tremendous potential for all walks of life; disabled and non-disabled to come together and make dreams come true.
Through the arts medium, the project aims to progress the self esteems of 420 disabled individuals and to enable them to break social deprivation and be more active and productive.
Talent improving workshops in various areas of the arts such as vocal music, dance, film, animation and photography will be conducted. Through the participation of these workshops; disabled individuals will form a new dynamic power that will break social degeneration.
Furthermore, the project will develop a policy advisory note on local action for national follow up of Article 30 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Disabled which Turkey has signed.
Contact Person:
Hansın Doğan, UNDP İstanbul (Email: hansin.dogan@undp.org)
The Black Sea coastal zone is shared by six countries including Turkey, Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia and Ukraine and it has been abused for the past 80 years in particular. WWF-Turkey, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), The Coca Cola Company (TCCC) and the Black Sea Commission (BSC) launched the Black Sea Tool Box Project on the occasion of the World Black Sea Day on 31 October. The Black Sea Tool Box project aims to raise awareness among children to make them part of the solution for the environmental problems that Black Sea is facing.
Through the project, which focuses on the 9-12 age group, attention will be drawn to issues concerning the Black Sea, and children will be informed about the sustainable use of natural resources through an education set that has been enriched with various games. The project, which will initially be launched along the Turkish Black Sea coast, will later be implemented in other countries on the Black Sea coast. As a result of partnerships to be formed with the ministries of education of participating countries, a large number of girls and boys are expected to be reached. Previously, a similar training kit, the Danube Box was developed and it was successfully used at the schools in the countries by the Danube River.
The Black Sea whose shores are inhabited by 300 million people has been over polluted by maritime transport, domestic and industrial waste due to its semi enclosed shape, it has been subjected to overfishing and damaging fishing practices and has lost its indigenous species as a result of vessels’ dumping of bilge water to an extent whereby it cannot cope with it any more. Fishing carried out by using dynamite, poisoning, electric shock and trawlers has resulted in the loss of 80% of the fish population in the Black Sea during the last 30-40 years. Sturgeon, one of the oldest species living in the Black Sea has decreased in numbers rapidly during the last 20 years and has become a vulnerable species. An average of 300,000-400,000 tons of fish are caught by countries on the Black Sea coastal zone. 75% of this amount is caught along the Turkish coast of the Black Sea. Each year, 95,000 tons of oil slicks pollute the Black Sea as a result of accidents involving oil spills and transport activities. Also, it is estimated that 571 million cubic metres of human origin solid waste is dumped into the Black Sea.
To protect Black Sea –the biggest water basin of the world with naturally having no oxygen- against pollution; Turkey, Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia and Ukraine have signed the Bucharest Convention (Convention on the Protection of the Black Sea against Pollution). Among these six countries, only Turkey does not have a declared marine protected area along the Turkish Black Sea coast.
The Black Sea Tool Box is a sub project executed under Every Drop Matters project initiated by UNDP and TCCC with a budget of 7 million dollars. With the participation of WWF-Turkey and BSC, The Black Sea Tool Box Project will be a strong start for finding a solution to the problems facing the Black Sea.
Even the organizers of the first National Youth Employment Summit in Çorum were not sure whether the summit bringing together so many organizations would be successful or not… Preparation meetings continuing for months, participation of representatives from minimum of 25-30 organizations in every meeting and voicing of disparate opinions from each and every organization showed how difficult the youth employment issue was. Led by the Turkish Agency for Employment (İŞKUR) and organized with the support of related government institutions, leading trade unions, major civil society organizations (CSO) in the area of youth, the summit on 15-16 November however gave hope to participants.
In his speech given at the summit, attended by approximately 250 people, Turkish Minister of Labour and Social Security Faruk Çelik stated that issues concerning youth employment and social security required long-term planning and strategies should not be thought as short-term remedies. Making a speech in the beginning of the meeting on behalf of United Nations (UN) agencies financing the summit, Gülay Aslantepe, Turkey Director of International Labour Organizaton (ILO), said that she was pleased that so many stakeholders got together and a strategy would be formulated with the participation of youth on the prominent topic of youth employment.
After representatives of trade unions expressed their viewpoints on the issue, public institutions and trade union representatives together with youth formulated strategies concerning issues such as facilitating registered youth employment, supporting youth entrepreneurship, establishing the link between education and employment, strengthening the labour market adaptation of young people, providing equal access to education and employment opportunities and enhancing services of occupational counseling.
On the second day of the meeting, the results of these workshops together with exemplary projects concerning youth employment of Youth Association for Habitat, Community Volunteers Foundation (TOG) and Turkish National Agency were presented. In the presentations of civil society organizations in the area of youth, the impact of cooperation with the private sector on the lives of young people was emphasized and great transformations created through funds and scholarships, which were provided by the National Agency during Turkey’s EU accession, were pointed out.
In the end of the workshops, it was suggested by youth that youth CSOs and Turkish Employment Agency (İŞ-KUR) create a joint project and a national youth employment platform is formed. In the final speech of the summit, General Manager of İŞ-KUR Namık Ata stated that all of the suggesstions would be heeded, the results from the workshops would be gradually implemented in a programmed manner. Namık Ata thanked especially Çorum Municipality and all the organizations and participants that have supported the summit.
According to the National Human Development Report titled Youth in Turkey prepared by UNDP in March 2008, youth employment is one of the most significant issues in Turkey. Out of around 12 million young people in Turkey between the ages of 15-24, close to 5 million of them are idle...These young people neither study nor work. Approximately 1 million of them seek jobs, 300 thousand of them have given up hope of finding a job, 650 thousand are disabled, 2.2 million young women who define themselves as house girls neither study nor seek jobs.
The initiative with a total estimated budget of 2,500,000 Euros and 18 months of duration is being funded by the European Commission.
Ministry of Interior’s Undersecretary-General Mehmet Tekmen stated in his opening speech that through this project it is intended to have a snapshot of existing internal security issues in Turkey and assess various initiatives taking place in other European countries with an aim to find possible solutions to the existing bottlenecks and challenges.
“The launch has been a success. The high turn out shows how the parties are concerned about the issue at hand” said Mahmood Ayub, the UNDP Resident Coordinator. In his address to the participants, Ayub told that although the state continues to be the main responsible party in providing security in the 21st century, the growing realization that security can no longer be maintained only by armed and uniformed forces leads us to have a global approach where the civil participation becomes fundamental in tackling the challenges.
The Civilian Oversight of Internal Security Project aims at structurally incorporating the expanded enjoyment of civil rights by citizens and the democratic control of internal security in the regulatory system and public administration practices of Turkey.
The project‘s main activities revolve around creating awareness, learning about other experiences, assessing legal bottlenecks and evaluating trends in three pilot project cities namely Erzurum, İstanbul and Niğde and therefore developing proposals towards improvement of existing legal framework to enable the civilian oversight by both parties--citizens and the public administrators--. Preparation of the final proposals for enacting appropriate legislation through the parliament is not within the scope of this project.
The opening speech of the morning session is followed by a panel session in the afternoon on “Civilian Oversight of Internal Security Forces: Trends in the Reform of EU Member States”. The panel was chaired by Sebastian Roche; Chief Technical Advisor of the Project and participated by Dominique Lapprand, Colonel Gendarmerie from France, Juan Manuael Gil Sanchez, Colonel – Civil Attaché and Ramon Arenas Vecino, Police Attaché from Spain and Graham Ellison, Professor Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice from Northern Ireland.
The participants have exchanged various opinions and concerns about the legislative framework on the presented cases of France, Spain and the United Kingdom. For further details on the related legislative frameworks in France, Spain and the United Kingdom please click here.
The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation has allocated US$ 750,000 for the project which will be implemented by the United Nations Development Programme and the Department of Youth Services under the General Directorate for Youth and Sports. The project was launched in Ankara by the President of Turkey Abdullah Gül and the President of Switzerland Pascal Couchepin on 11 November 2008 at Ankara State Art and Sculpture Museum.
The Swiss-UN Fund for Youth (S-UN Fund) is a grant and technical assistance fund which targets young men and women from the age group 18 to 24, who have migrated from rural to urban areas and face difficulties of social integration due to human development deprivations experienced during childhood.
The S-UN Fund provides financial support and mentoring to project ideas of young men and women, which focus on opportunities created by culture and tourism sectors while utilizing information and communication technologies and demonstrating commitment to core UN values. In doing so, the S-UN Fund empowers youth to improve their chances in life, treating them as partners and right holders. The project management will ensure that young women benefit equally from the project, by addressing the needs of young women in the project designs and in all project activities.
The three pilot provinces of the S-UN Fund are marked with abundant cultural and touristic resources, active youth potential and institutionalized structures of existing Youth Centers, as well as high rates of migration they receive. All young people, between 18-24 years of age and living in these provinces, have the chance to realize their project ideas by joining the S-UN Fund. Throughout the two-year implementation period, young men and women in project teams will also receive project management training and mentoring.
Apart from the potential benefits of supported youth initiatives in the pilot provinces during two years of implementation, expanding the geographical scope of S-UN Fund, ensuring its sustainability through joint ownership of public sector, private sector and civil society, and affecting the Government’s youth policies through establishment of a model practice are the ultimate targets of the project.
[BAGLANTILAR]
The report, Post-Conflict Economic Recovery: Enabling Local Ingenuity, is a comprehensive analysis focusing on three critical factors: the importance of local ingenuity to guide recovery, the states role in promoting this ingenuity, and the policies needed to rebuild battered economies and reduce the risk of conflict recurrence. The study cites examples of countries that have succeeded in rekindling post-conflict economies and those that continue to flounder, discussing the foundations that are so vital to foster post-conflict economic recovery.
This holistic view of post-conflict recovery is based on experience UNDP has gained working in many countries around the world, many of them devastated by violent conflict, said UNDP Administrator Kemal Derviş. It has enabled us to reconsider our role in helping countries to build back better after months, years or decades of conflict.
Providing a fresh look at the challenges facing countries emerging from conflict, the report emphasizes that recovery programming must be based on sound understanding of local dynamics. Without such a foundation, policies aimed to help may inadvertently exacerbate tensions. Conflict does not destroy local economies, it transforms them. It introduces new and frequently positive economic opportunities for women. It can also fuel inequities among different groups and minorities. The first lesson for the international community in post-conflict recovery is therefore to do no harm by promoting actions that lower the risk of conflict recurrence and fuel positive economic activity.
A second crucial lesson is that local actors must lead recovery. Even after years of conflict, war-torn communities possess human and other resources that can support recovery, and it is often through local efforts that economies are rebuilt. The report not only recognizes that local actors can drive recovery, it also encourages the international community to focus its efforts on working with and building on the activities of local communities and institutions.
The study also examines the role external partners should play when it comes to post-conflict recovery. It calls upon international partners to support debt relief, which provides much-needed breathing space in the early post-war years; to generate employment, which is the best way to ensure that economic growth benefits the majority of the population; and to support national efforts to rebuild the capacity of the state and secure its legitimacy.
"Post-conflict recovery is not about restoring pre-war economic or institutional arrangements", said Derviş. "It is about investing in people and institutions in ways that redress the factors that may have led to the conflict in the first place. The end of a conflict presents a small window of opportunity to address pre-war distortions and launch sustained economic recovery and development", he added.
The book; Pioneering the Human Development Revolution: An intellectual Biography of Mahbub ul Haq, edited by Khadija Haq and Richard Ponzio, was launched last week at UNDP in New York by Professor Amartya Sen, long time friend and colleague of the late Mahbub ul Haq. Sen talked about ul Haq's intellectual capacity, personal commitment and good communication skills. "Mahbub understood long before me that if we should succeed in communicating our message, we would need numbers and new statistics as a way of getting the media's and people's attention", Sen said.
Another of his friends and colleagues, Sir Richard Jolly, remembered Mahbub ul Haq for the opinion that "what we need today is not so much intellectual brilliance, but intellectual bravery".
Together with amongst others Amartya Sen and Richard Jolly, Mahbub ul Haq, founded the UNDP Human Development Report. Director of the Human Development Report Office, Jeni Klugman facilitated the launch, which was opened by Khadija Haq, President of Mahbub ul Haq Human Development Centre in Pakistan.
"Mahbub ul Haq initiated a global movement for people-centric development where education, health, and political and economic empowerment together became the yardstick for measuring a country's performance" Khadija Haq said. She also talked about the effect Mahbub ul Haq had on people. "In 1968 October, Mahbub became critically ill and the medical system in Pakistan at that time could not cope with his illness. President Ayub Khan, whose government Mahbub criticized earlier for crony capitalism, took the extraordinary steps to send Mahbub to London for treatment saying, we must save this national treasure".
After a career in shaping economic policies for his homeland, Pakistan as Finance Minister, influencing policies at the World Bank and other international development fora, Mahbub came to work for UNDP in the 1990s. "All the seeds of human development that had been growing in Mahbub's mind over the previous 30 years blossomed. Working with the Human Development Report gave Mahbub the world stage to propagate his ideas for human development, human security and women's empowerment. Finally, Mahbub had a home run!" Khadija Haq said. To read the full introduction by Khadija Haq click here.
About the book
Comprising essays of Haq's intellectual partners and colleagues, Pioneering the Human Development Revolution: An intellectual Biography of Mahbub ul Haq traces the evolution of his ideas, especially the links he established between economic growth, people's well being and poverty alleviation. Each essay situates and discusses his contribution to the larger development debate and assesses the impact of his ideas on the contemporary to the larger development debate and assesses the impact of his ideas on the contemporary global development agenda.
The initiative aims to promote the positive impact of migration using an innovative, bottom-up approach that will support small-scale actors to undertake concrete actions.
Taking on board the recommendations of the first Global Forum on Migration and Development, held in Brussels in 2007, the Joint Initiative will reinforce the role of civil society organizations and local authorities, by ensuring that the capacity of these key stakeholders is strengthened to become efficient actors for development. Through the codification of good practices in Migration & Development, the EC-UN Joint Initiative aims to ensure that decision makers are better informed of good practice in this area, with a view to informing policy making.
The EC-UN Joint Initiative also aims to create fora where practitioners can meet and exchange knowledge with the aim of facilitating Migration & Development interventions and dialogue. This will be achieved through the organization of a fair in Brussels in the first week of December 2008 and the creation of a web-based knowledge management platform providing an open forum to share news and information, collate documentation about existing Migration & Development initiatives, develop individual skills and provide mutual support.
A Call for Proposals will be launched in early December 2008 to provide 11 million Euro in funding for concrete project proposals in the four priority areas of the Joint Initiative: migrant communities, migrant rights, the capacities of migrants, as well as migrant remittances.