Projects > Think Future - Volunteer Together (senior volunteering)

 

The Final Conference of the project took place on 19th November 2009 in the European Parliament (Brussels) and was organised by CEV in partnership with all project’s partners. It presented the very interesting results of the project, including methodology of the exchanges, the role of the different partners and practical recommendations on how to support further senior volunteering in Europe.

The conference gathered more than 100 participants - representatives of the project partners, but also civil society organisations, policy-makers from different levels and other stakeholders. The conference was opened by Renzo Razzano, President of SPES, which was the initiator of the project, Marian Harkin, MEP and the host of the conference and Eva Hambach, CEV President. Two introductory speeches were made by Krzysztof Iszkowski, from DG Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities of the European Commission and Markus Held, CEV Director. This was followed by various presentations made by representatives of the project partners and senior volunteers who took part in the exchanges. In the afternoon, a panel debate gathered representatives of various stakeholders and policy-makers at European, national and local levels. The discussion addressed the main policy recommendations to be made in order to promote senior volunteering all over Europe.

The main working language of the conference was English and there was simultaneous interpretation in the 5 languages of the project: Italian, Slovenian, Slovakian, Romanian and Hungarian.

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[23 June 2009] The third and last partners’ meeting took place between 17 and 20 June in the lovely Romanian town – Cluj Napoca and it was hosted by Pro Vobis. The project partners discussed the outcomes of the project, which will be included in the Project final report (available at this website in early autumn) and they start preparing the final conference which will take place in November in Brussels. They also had a chance to visit Pro Vobis volunteer centre and discuss with the senior volunteers who took part in the exchanges. The project was visited by the representative of the European Commission, who took part in the discussions on how is the best way to valorise the project results through publications and conference.

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[19 March 2009] The European Commission organised on 11 of March a seminar on " Volunteering of older people and the role of public policies". The objective of the seminar was to collect proposals of the stakeholders on the role expected from the European Union in order to foster volunteering of older people in Europe, and beyond proposals on a possible European year 2012 on intergenerational solidarity and active ageing in order to prepare the decision of the Commission. The seminar brought together members of the European Commission’s Expert Group on Demographic Issues and other stakeholders such as policy-makers, NGOs, trade unions, and business which discussed how the EU and national public authorities can support senior volunteering. 11 representatives of CEV and its members organisations participated in the event - among them representatives of C.A.R.D.O, MOVISIE, ÖKA , Slovenska Filantropija, SPES, Volunteering Ireland and Vlaams Steunpunt Vriwilligerswerk.

During the seminar such topics were presented and discussed as: evidence on volunteering of older persons from statistical studies, societal outcome and individual benefits for older volunteers, barriers to volunteering and conditions of successes as well as public policy support to promote volunteering. Renzo Razzano, Vice President of CEV and President of SPES, spoke in the name of CEV on the Plenary debate on support at EU level with representatives of social partners, governments, NGO, presenting some results of the Think Future Volunteer Together project . An important accent during discussions was put on European Year of Volunteering 2011 and participants voiced a need to ensure synergies between 2011 and 2012 being European year on intergenerational solidarity and active ageing.

The presentations of the seminar are now available on the European Commission data base CIRCA at the following address:
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/empl/demographic_change/library?l=/volunteering_2009-03-11&vm=detailed&sb=Title  

Project Background

In 2050 60+ population in Europe will increase to 35,1%. European Union (EU) encourages the Member States to promote the activities stimulating so called the active ageing of the European population. However, this active ageing should no longer be seen only as ensuring that people work longer. It should be referring to active engagement of elderly beyond retirement – e.g. as volunteers. In this sense, volunteering is not mainly about repeating tasks that have been done in professional life, but it has to do with participation, solidarity and active citizenship.

    

 

 

Opportunities, differences and difficulties of volunteering for all ages was the topic of the conference organised in the framework of the CEV General Assembly in Cluj Napoca (Romania) in May 2005, hosted by the Pro Vobis. The conference “Volunteering for all ages – Summit of generations” shed new light on differences among European countries regarding the involvement of elderly people in volunteering activity. Experiences and data show that in East & Central European countries elderly people are extremely reluctant to engage in community action. In the same e.g. in Italy large numbers of volunteers are retired people of both sexes over 60 years of age. The exchange of good practises between the countries with different senior volunteering patterns could be mutually beneficial - to the beneficiary and the larger community, but also to the volunteer who through active engagement preserves more easily physical and intellectual independence.

Project description:

Think Future, Volunteer Together is the project financed by the European Commission in the frame of the ENEA preparatory action of the DG EMPL - Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities on active ageing and mobility of elderly people. In this action, volunteering was recognized as on of the tools to mobilize the full potential of older people for active ageing and their contribution to society. The project coordinator and manager is one of the CEV Italian member organisation - SPES – Centro di Servizio per il Volontariato del Lazio,

General objective of the project is to demonstrate how the exchange of good practice through international exchanges of elderly volunteers (target group are people over 55 years old) among 5 EU countries - Italy, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia can contribute to change of the negative attitudes and how it can stimulate social engagement, thus benefiting local communities.

 

    

Main activities were designed by taking into account the differences of the elderly volunteering sector between the EU ‘old’ and ‘new’ member states and they include 100 volunteers exchanges followed by the microprojects implemented by volunteers on the basis of their experiences learned abroad.

    

The project foresees also activities for the promotion of the participation of older people in volunteering activities, analysis of results and proposal of programmes and actions for increasing the involvement of older people in volunteering activities at European level, which will be presented on the final project conference in Brussels in November 2009.

    

Time frame: 24 months (from December 2007 to December 2009)

    

PARTNERS:

     

	SPES – Centro di Servizio per il Volontariato del Lazio, Italy (project coordinator)
	Slovenska filantropija, Slovenia
	C.A.R.D.O. Slovakia
	ÖKA - Önkentes Központ Alapitvany, Hungary
	Pro Vobis Centrul National de Voluntariat, Romania
	CEV - the European Volunteer Centre, Belgium (policy advising, promotion and dissemination of the project results at the EU level)

           

On the national level, in Italy there are 4 partners:
Commune di Roma (City of Rome)
AUSER – Association for self-management of services and solidarity
ADA – Association for the aged people’s rights
ANTEAS – National Association for the Active Third Age for Solidarity

   

    FURTHER INFORMATION and LINKS:

    

Adult and senior volunteering in the new EU countries
Methodology of international exchanges
Exchanges’ schedule
Implementation phase and microprojects
Promotion and monitoring

    

External Links:

C.A.R.D.O. website about the project (in Slovak)

OKA website about the project (in Hungarian)

ProVobis website about the project (in Romanian)

    

This project is supported by the European Commission in the framework of the ENEA project