Season´s Greetings 0 Reply

We wish to all our members and our partners an excellent Holiday Season, full of peace and prosperity, and a Wonderful New Year 2020.

Let´s work together and make wonderful ideas to come true in 2020!

Youth Standing Up for Human Rights to open a New Dialogue Café in Novi Sad| 0 Reply

Within the framework of a cooperation agreement established between United Nations Associations of Serbia and the Dialogue Café Association, the opening of new Dialogue Cafe in Novi Sad is planned for December 12, next to two Dialogue Cafes in Serbia that are already operational, one in Belgrade and one in Novi Pazar. Thanks to this amazing partnership, the Dialogue Cafe network will be strengthen as a whole, but at the same time its branch in Serbia will be stronger.

Dialogue Café is based on the radical, but simple idea that people have many things in common, and given the opportunity, they will explore their common interests, new collaborations and stimulating ideas that address the major issues of today. This kind of conversations and collaborations can lead to new ways of thinking and doing: they can empower individuals and communities, break down prejudice and misconceptions, and promote greater understanding and co-operation across cultures.

Dialogue Cafe in Novi Sad will be organized by the United Nations Associations of Serbia with the support of Novi Sad 2019 European Youth Capital and Youth Office Novi Sad. The Official Opening of Dialogue Cafe Novi Sad will take place on December 12, 2019, from 15h to 17h (London time). The official opening will followed by a session focused on Human Rights and Youth with the aim of celebrating the International Human Rights Day.

Programme

Dialogue Café Novi Sad (Serbia): 

• Mr. Milorad Kondic, President of the UN Association of Serbia
• HE Françoise Jacob, UN Resident Coordinator in Serbia
• Mr. Vlastimir Mastilović, Head of the City Management for Sports and Youth, City of Novi Sad
• Mr. Vukasin Grozdanović, Coordinator of the Novi Sad – European Youth Capital 2019.

Dialogue Café Belgrade (Serbia)

• Ms. Katarina Velkov, Serbian UN Youth Delegate 2019-2020

Dialogue Café Évora (Portugal)

• Mr. Henrique Sim Sim, Adviser to the Secretary General of the Eugénio de Almeida Foundation
• Ms. Margarida Oliveira, Dialogue Café Évora manager

Dialogue Café Cidade de Praia (Cape Verde)

• Ms. Indira Pires, Executive Director of the Pedro Pires Institute for Leadership
• Ms. Djalita Fialho, Member of the Board of the Pedro Pires Institute for Leadership

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar (Serbia)

• Ms. Farima Durovic, Director of Centar Duga

Dialogue Café Lisbon (Portugal): 

• Ms. Dalia Sendra, Manager of Dialogue Café
• Representative of the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe

Session on International Human Rights Day on the topic “Youth and Human Rights” (From 15h45 to 17h00 London time)

Human Rights Day[1] is on December 10 – the day the United Nations General Assembly adopted, in 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

2019 Topic: Youth Standing Up for Human Rights.

Under general call to action “Stand Up for Human rights,” we aim to celebrate the potential of youth as agents of change, amplify their voices, and engage global audience in the promotion and protection of rights.
This Human Rights Day, we highlight the role of young people and their participation in social movements in order to stand up for human rights and bring change[2].

Never too young to change the world

• Youth participation is essential in order to achieve sustainable development for all
• Youth can play a crucial role in positive change
• Empowering youth to know better their rights and claim them will bring benefits on global level

#StandUp4HumanRights

• Human rights are relevant to all of us, every day
• Our shared humanity is rooted in these universal values
• Equality, justice and freedom prevent violence and sustain peace
• Whenever and wherever humanity’s values are abandoned, we all are at greater risk
• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights empowers us all
• We need to stand up for our rights and those of others.

Programme

Dialogue Café Novi Sad (Serbia): 

Moderator: Mr. Stefan Radoičić, Teaching Assistant at the Law Faculty, University of Novi Sad

• Ms. Branislava Arađan, Vice-President of Junior Chamber International – JCI Novi Sad
• Mr. Srđan Hromiš, President of European Youth Parliament Serbia
• Mr. Igor Stojilović, Youth Policy and advocacy coordinator, NGO Center for Youth Work Novi Sad.

Dialogue Café Belgrade (Serbia):

• Mr. Strahinja Radovanović, UNA Serbia Dialogue Café Team
• Mr. Uroš Anđelković, UNA-Serbia BIMUN Team
• Ms. Katarina Velkov, Serbian UN Youth Delegate 2019-2020

Dialogue Café Lisbon (Portugal):

• Ms. Noémia Certo Simões, Volunteer
• Representative of the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe
• Mr. Felix Soares, Young Educators Portugal

 Dialogue Café Novi Pazar (Serbia):

• Ms. Amina Šemsović, MA in English language and literature, MA in human rights & democracy (ERMA program) and Senior fellow at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva.
• Representative of Cultural Centre Dama

With the participation of Dialogue Café Évora and Cidade de Praia!  

JOIN US AND SHARE WITH US THIS AMAZING MOMENT FOR Dialogue Cafe Network!

[1] https://www.un.org/en/observances/human-rights-day

[2] https://standup4humanrights.org/en/2019/highlights_13.html

Celebrating United Nations International Volunteer Day 2019 0 Reply

CONTEXT

By United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) mandate, the International Volunteer Day (IVD)[1] is celebrated annually on 5 December with the aim of celebrating volunteers and organisations efforts, promote their values and disseminate their work. The focus of the IVD 2019 is “Volunteers for an Inclusive Future” in order to highlight the role of volunteers in raising awareness, inspiring others and achieving the SDGs.

“Achieving #SDGs depends on empowerment, inclusion & equality of all people. Volunteer action widens spaces for engagement, including for remote & marginalized populations.” (UN Volunteer Programme)

There are many types of volunteering: skills-based, in developing countries, virtual, on learning programmes and schools, on environment, in an emergency, corporate and community based. Volunteers also play a key role in the implementation of social and third sectors organisations by implementing projects, involving communities, and supporting dissemination among many other tasks. Volunteers might work at the local as the international areas.

With the aim of celebrating the International Volunteer Day, Dialogue Café Évora lead by Eugenio de Almeida Foundation and Dialogue Café members in Cidade de Praia, Novi Pazar and Lisbon will organise a session on volunteering with the aim of celebrating volunteer effort and recognising their contribution to communities and the society. With this purpose, volunteers will be invited to participate in this session and share with us their views, motivations and experiences. During the session we will also discover the existing opportunities for volunteering and how beneficial can be to volunteer as well as will be invited to discuss the following questions, but not limited to:

- Why did you decide to volunteer?

- Advantages get with volunteering?

- Share your best volunteering experience

- How can we promote volunteering among the youngest generations? What about elder generations? 

Participation is free and open!

PROGRAMME

Dialogue Café Évora – Eugenio de Almeida Foundation – Social Innovation Centre

• Inês Gonçalves, Eugénio de Almeida Foundation Volunteering Programme
• Raquel Alexandre, Volunteer
• Joana Good da Silva, Volunteer Hamilton da Cruz
• Clara Matos, Volunteer
• Maria João Tomé, Volunteer

Dialogue Café Évora – ADRAL | EvoraTech Fab Lab 

• Drº José Tavares, Refood Évora
• Nuno Rosmaninho, Humanitarian Centre of Évora – Cruz Vermelha (Red Cross)

Dialogue Café Lisbon (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation)

• Maria do Rosário Nunes, Regional Direction, Portuguese Institute of Sport and Youth, Lisbon Youth Centre

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar (Centar Duga)

• Haris Imamović, Dialogue Novi Pazar Team
• Amila Sarenkapic, Volunteer at Centar Duga

JOIN IN!

REGISTRATION & CONTACTS

Dialogue Café Lisbon – (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation) – Dalia Sendra (daliasendra@casadoregalo.pt)

Dialogue Café Évora – Margarida Oliveira/FEA (margarida.oliveira@fea.pt) & Ana Rita Valido/ADRAL (ana.valido@adral.pt)

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar – Fatima Durovic (fatimadurovic@gmail.com)

[1] Resolution A/RES/40/212 on 17 December 1985

Entrepreneurship as a promoter of soft skills – the new young leaders 0 Reply

Soft skills are defined as the interpersonal qualities that do not depend on acquired knowledge – hard skills – and combine different interpersonal abilities, character traits and career attributes, as well as social and emotional intelligence among many others. These capacities are becoming extremely relevant because in the very competitive world we live, such capacities might help you to become a successful candidate from other job seekers. It is about “something” that distinguish you when everyone possesses the same level of knowledge, training, and technical abilities. Some examples of soft skills are: communication skills, leadership, work ethic, creative problem solving, design thinking, time management, conflicts resolution, integrity, flexibility, teamwork, and socioemotional intelligence.

Soft skills are extremely relevant in the field of entrepreneurship because they allow you to connect with costumers, clients, partners and other stakeholders as well as share your ideas and knowledge. Indeed, soft skills might be the key to make your entrepreneurship project successful.

Entrepreneurship is at the heart of Dialogue Café action and many sessions have been organised with the aim of supporting entrepreneurs and sharing knowledge in this field. With this purpose, the Eugenio de Almeida Foundation, one of Dialogue Café Évora hosts, and Dialogue Café Association organise a session aimed at analysing the role of entrepreneurship in promoting soft skills and giving a space to young entrepreneurs to share their testimonials and knowledge.

The session is celebrated in the framework of the Global Entrepreneurship Week, celebrated annually during a week in November “to engage in connecting entrepreneurs with collaborators, mentors and stakeholder groups in order to develop a network of synergistic partners and new opportunities”[1].

For this session, young entrepreneurs and organisations supporting entrepreneurs will be invited to reflect about key soft skills for entrepreneurship and to discuss the following questions, but not limited to:

• What are the soft skills that new young leaders value?
• Why are soft skills so valued?
• Soft skills are as important to the success of our youth as indicators more traditional academics?
• Soft skills play a key role in the emergence of a business idea and growing a new company?

Programme

Dialogue Café Belgrade – Youth Office

• Ana Milojević, Dialogue Cafe Serbia Team
• Marijana Marinković, President of the Youth Business Forum
• Jelena Joksimović, Start-up company Uradi-zaradi

Dialogue Café Évora – ADRAL | EvoraTech Fab Lab & Eugenio de Almeida Foundation – Social Innovation Centre

• Carlos Ramos, B-Brincar
• Nuno Gomes, Consultant on entrepreneurship projects
• Natália Melo, Specialist on communication and history taking

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar – Centar Duga

• Esma Hot, Consultant for OSCE, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe 

And the involvement of Dialogue Café Lisbon (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation) and Dialogue Café Cidade de Praia (Pedro Pires Institute)!

Participation is free and open!

JOIN US! 

Contacts for detailed information

• Dialogue Café Association and Dialogue Café Lisbon - Dalia Sendra (daliasendra@casadoregalo.pt)
• Dialogue Café Belgrade – Biljana Vukosavljevic (unaserbia@gmail.com)   
• Dialogue Café Évora – Margarida Oliveira/FEA (margarida.oliveira@fea.pt) & Ana Rita Valido/ADRAL (ana.valido@adral.pt)
• Dialogue Café Novi Pazar – Fatima Durovic (fatimadurovic@gmail.com)
• Dialogue Café Cidade de Praia – Indira Pires (ipires@institutopedropires.org.cv)

[1] https://www.genglobal.org/

Water, an essential element for life 0 Reply

On 1 January 2016, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development — adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at an historic UN Summit — officially came into force. Over the next fifteen years, with these new Goals that universally apply to all, countries will mobilize efforts to end all forms of poverty, fight inequalities and tackle climate change, while ensuring that no one is left behind. While the SDGs are not legally binding, governments are expected to take ownership and establish national frameworks for the achievement of the 17 Goals. Countries have the primary responsibility for follow-up and review of the progress made in implementing the Goals, which will require quality, accessible and timely data collection. Regional follow-up and review will be based on national-level analyses and contribute to follow-up and review at the global level.

In this framework, water as essential element for life plays a key role in the achievements of the 2030 Agenda. SDG 6 on Clean water and sanitation and SDG 14 on Life below water are fully dedicated to water, but it´s also directly related to all of them, to hunger, to health, climate action, sustainable cities and desertification for example.

Through this session, Dialogue Café members aim to address the challenges of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with regards to water in a global perspective and by sharing concrete examples of good practices being implemented everywhere. Through this session will also aim at boosting youth participation in the 2030 Agenda and promote their role in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. Young activists, good practices, civil society organisations, researchers and people in general will debate about the relevance of water in the 2030 Agenda and share their experiences, ideas and good practices to confront the critical challenge of access to water resources.

Some questions to be raised are:

• What are some issues facing water resources?
• What are some challenges to providing clean water?
• What is sustainable water use?
• How can we increase understanding of the many ways water matters?
• How can we minimise the presence of micropollutants in the environment, especially in the water?

Dialogue Café members joining this session are Belgrade, Evora, Lisbon and Novi Pazar.

Programme

Dialogue Café Belgrade

• Uroš Anđelković, UNA-Serbia Dialogue Cafe Team
• Ana Milojević, UNA-Serbia BIMUN Team
  
• Tijana Djurovic, Belgrade Secretariat for the Protection of the Environment

Dialogue Café Evora (ADRAL| Evora Tech & Social Innovation Centre of the Eugénio de Almeida Foundation)

• Alexandra Correia, Project “Alentejo Azul”, which aims to stimulate action on the theme of the sea and water resources, materializing in a program to create new companies and support business innovation in the sector, with integrated actions and promoted by a strong partnership. , claiming to be an unavoidable national reference, with international visibility, of the blue economy.
• Ana Rita Valido, TWIST – Estratégia Transnacional para a Inovação no domínio da Água, Evora – ADRAL
• Barbara Tita, Expert | Environment and Spatial Planning Department EDIA (EDIA – Alqueva Sa Development and Infrastructure Company)
• Ana Ana Ilhéu, Director of the Department of Environment and Spatial Planning (EDIA – Alqueva Sa Development and Infrastructure Company)

With the participation of other guests in Lisbon (Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation) and Dialogue Cafe Novi Pazar (Centar Duga).

Participation is free and open.

For further information contact us at info(@)dialoguecafe.org

Social Impact, more effective and user friendly methodologies 0 Reply

Background

Social impact might be defined as the positive change addressing a social challenge created as result of a thoughtful set of actions implemented with this purpose. Sometimes social impact is identified also with social change, social innovation, social entrepreneurship or social entrepreneur because all of these concepts are identified as multiples paths towards a desired outcome. Their interpretation depends indeed on the context. Evidencing social impact and how to measure it might be one of the major challenges related to this field of intervention. Identifying methods, strategies and methodologies to impact actions, projects or programmes aimed at boosting social impact, has been a clear priority in the latest years. Doing well, might help charities, social organisations, entrepreneurs, and any other agent motivated by social change to improve his/her action, compare its achievements with other organisations and communicate evidence to attract further investment. Some reflections to take into consideration about social impact evidence might be sustainability, who benefits?, how many people benefit? and how do they benefit?

Social innovation is at the heart of Dialogue Café and many sessions have been focused on social impact. Given its relevance, Dialogue Café Evora proposes to organise a debate on social impact methodologies to deeply analyse how best we can improve and measure social impact action. With this purpose, Dialogue Café Association and its members are organising a session untitled “Social Impact, more effective and user friendly methodologies”.

Social entrepreneurs and organisations promoting social impact will be invited to discuss the following questions, but not limited to:

What is social impact?

• What are the most effective and user-friendly methodologies?
• How can you evaluate the social impact of projects?
• Organizations recognize the realities in which act?
• Can organizations always pull impact results on their projects?

The session will take place on 24 October 2019 from 15h to 17h London time.

Provisional Programme

Dialogue Café Évora

– Henrique Sim Sim, Social Innovation Centre, Eugénio de Almeida Foundation

- David Prazeres, President, League of Friends of the Hospital of Evora

Dialogue Café Lisbon

– Ana Margarida Ferreira, UNIDCOM/IADE – Research Unit in Design and Communication, IADE-U University Institut of Art, Design and Entreprise

– Vítor Simões, 4Change

– João Machado, Manager of the Social Innovation Fund, Portugal Social Innovation

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar

– Martina Ilic, Founder, Liliputanke blog

– Aida Camovic, Founder, Liliputanke blog

With the participation of other experts in Dialogue Café Cidade de Praia!

Participation is free and open!

Join us and share your knowledge!

Contacts for detailed information

Dialogue Café Association and Dialogue Café Lisbon - Dalia Sendra (daliasendra@casadoregalo.pt)

Dialogue Café Évora – Margarida Oliveira / Eugénio de Almeida Foundation (margarida.oliveira@fea.pt) & Ana Rita Valido / ADRAL Agency (ana.valido@adral.pt)

Dialogue Café Novi Pazar – Fatima Durovic (fatimadurovic@gmail.com)

Dialogue Café Cidade de Praia – Indira Pires (ipires@institutopedropires.org.cv)