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Youth Library |
A wide range of institutions and organisations are active across Europe in supporting youth through projects and initiatives that aim to improve the flow of information for young people in rural areas.
The following list provides an overview of such projects and initiatives.
EU official resources
| EU Youth Strategy |
| The EU Youth Strategy (2010-2018) intends to provide more and equal opportunities for young people in education and in the labour market, and to encourage them to be active citizens and participate in society. The strategy is implemented through initiatives in eight fields of action, such as education and training; employment and entrepreneurship; health and well-being; participation; voluntary activities; social inclusion; youth and the world; and creativity and culture. |
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EU Youth Report [PDF ] |
| The EU Youth Report [PDF] provides a comprehensive picture of the situation of young people in Europe based on the latest available data, statistics and research. It portrays trends and developments in young people's conditions in different areas, corresponding to the ‘fields of action’. The report summarises the results of the first cycle of implementation of the Youth strategy (2010-2012) and gives an overview of the actions taken in this fields at European and national level as well as of those undertaken by young people themselves. |
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| Youth in action programme (2007-2013) |
| The program aims to inspire a sense of active citizenship, solidarity and tolerance among young Europeans and to involve them in shaping the Union's future. It promotes mobility within and beyond the EU borders, non-formal learning and intercultural dialogue, and encourages the inclusion of all young people, regardless of their educational, social and cultural background. |
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| Erasmus |
| Erasmus enables academia and business to work together through various activities, including teaching, training, exchanges and joint projects. Strong links between businesses and universities are important since the European economy relies on knowledge creation and application. Businesses have become increasingly involved in the ERASMUS Programme in recent years. Actions benefit both sides, and can lead to long-lasting partnerships. |
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| Leonardo Da Vinci |
| Leonardo Da Vinci funds several types of projects related to vocational education and training. It enables people to travel abroad to have a learning or training experience. |
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| Youth on the move |
| “Youth on the Move” is a comprehensive package of policy initiatives on education and employment for young people in Europe. Launched in 2010, it is part of the Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. It aims to improve young people’s education and employability, reduce high youth unemployment and increase the youth-employment rate. |
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| Youth Opportunities Initiative |
| The “Youth Opportunities Initiative” is part of “Youth on the move” and it consists of a set of measures, planned for 2012 and 2013, to drive down youth unemployment. This initiative targets young unemployed by helping people who left school or training without having achieved upper-secondary education to return to school or enrol in vocational training and graduates to find a first work experience. |
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| Youth first EURES job |
| Implemented in the framework of “Youth on the Move”, this initiative is a job mobility scheme which aims to help young Europeans find work in other EU countries. Its target for the period 2012-14 is to help some 5 000 people to fill job vacancies throughout the EU. Activities started in 2012 and involve employment services and job offers in different EU countries. |
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| EVE database |
| The EVE database is an innovative tool used to communicate the results of projects supported by the European Commission in the fields of Education, Training, Culture, Youth and Citizenship. This electronic platform enable beneficiaries to different EU financed projects, including “Youth in Action” to have visibility on the EU website. |
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Networks and Organisations involved in Youth-Related Actions in Europe
| The European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region (EUSBSR) |
| EUSBSR is the first macro-regional strategy created in Europe. It aims at reinforcing cooperation in order to face several challenges as well as to promote promoting a more balanced development in the area. Youth is one of its priority areas. |
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| SALTO |
| SALTO supports the inclusion of young people with fewer opportunities in international youth projects. SALTO Inclusion Resource Centre provides resources for persons and agencies supporting young people with fewer opportunities, and prospects for training, exchange and reflection on their inclusion practice. |
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| RURAL YOUTH EUROPE (RYEurope) |
| RYEurope is a European Non-Governmental Organisation for rural youth. Established in 1957, it is an umbrella for youth organisations working to promote and activate young people in the countryside by providing international training possibilities and working as an intermediary between national and youth organisations and public institutions at European level. |
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| European Youth Forum |
| It is the platform of youth organisations in Europe, which works to empower young people to participate actively in society to improve their own lives by representing and advocating their needs and interest and those of their organisations. |
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| 4H |
| 4H is a youth development organization dedicated to learning and understanding how programs help youth become responsible citizens leading healthy and productive lives and discovering critical science-focused innovations. |
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| Catholic Rural Youth Movement |
| KLJB is one of the biggest catholic youth movements in Germany. KLJB has represented the interests of rural youth and worked in favour of an active and vital Church since 1947. |
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| YouthAction Northern Ireland - United Kingdom |
| YouthAction Northern Ireland is a regional voluntary youth organisation (established in 1944), which works to enable young people achieve their full potential by providing services, information, training and support. It also seeks to extend the understanding of youth work through the development of innovative models of practice. The organisation works with youth workers and interested adults to support and assist young people as they strive to find and/or create their identity and develop their role in the community. It provides services complementary to statutory and other independent agencies throughout Northern Ireland. Particular emphasis is placed on groups from disadvantaged communities who are working towards their own development. A comparative study on youth and rural development was undertaken in 2006, taking in consideration the situation in Latvia, Sweden and Republic of Ireland [PDF ]. YouthAction has also delivered different programmes related to youth, such as the Rural Community Leadership Programme [PDF ] and the Community Leadership Apprenticeship in Youth Work [PDF ]. |
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National Rural Networks (NRN) Actions for Youth
| Youth in rural areas – Jeunes en milieu rural - France |
| A number of regional rural networks in France have been tackling youth issues. Some meeting at national level were also held on this topic. The French National Rural Network prepared a report ([PDF ], [PDF ]) that gives an overview of the activities and initiatives undertaken at national level in relation to young people living in rural areas, including some examples at EU level. This report is part of the thematic work carried out by the French Network on this field thematic with the aim to propose solutions for the difficulties young people in rural areas experience and to more actively involve them in the rural community life. |
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| Amaze me LEADER - Finland |
| The project was based on the idea of finding more inspiring ways to encourage young people to engage in Leader and rural development. The project was implemented as a contest through a car rally; tasks related to Leader projects were organised and youth from Finland and other countries to participate were invited to participate. The idea was developed by the Finnish National Rural Network in cooperation with youth representatives from the Leader areas involved. |
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| RURALand - Italy |
| The Italian National Rural Network has launched the national project “RURALand – Una finestra sul mondo rurale”, a web platform to promote better relations between agriculture and the rest of the society, with particular reference to young people. RURALand aims to bring knowledge on agriculture and rural development in primary and secondary school as well as universities. It include 5 specific initiatives referring to young people of different age brackets, namely “RDP at school”, “Rural4BABY”, “Rural4KIDS”, “Rural4teens” and “Rural4YOUTH” |
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| Children and Young People - Wales (UK) |
| The Wales Rural Network has carried thematic work on the topic of Children and Young people including issues such as parenting and childcare or child poverty. |
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| Ungagemang – Sweden |
| The Swedish National Rural Network has dedicated one thematic initiative to rural youth, with specific financial resources allocated to seminars and conferences held by or for young people. The initiative “Youth engagement” provides an insight on the involvement of young people in the future of their rural areas. |
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Examples of Youth-related projects
| PADIMA project - Policies Against Depopulation in Mountain Areas |
| The project implemented by Euromontana, focused on exchange of good practices in fighting depopulation in mountain areas. The project had a special focus on young people and how to make mountain areas more attractive for them as place to live and work. The results of the project were also presented at the 2012 European Mountain Convention whose main scope was to discuss how to improve the attractiveness of mountain areas for young generations. |
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| Rural adventure - Hungary |
| The project was implemented by the Young farmers organisation AGRYA in Hungary. The main goal of the project was to enable urban youth to have a real experience in an agricultural environment. Young farmers were also involved in the implementation of the project. Selected urban young people had the opportunity to know countryside and farming through working on a farm of a young farmer. Young farmers and visitors involved in the projects were roughly of the same age, thus making the transfer of information easier and more likely to succeed. The visitors wrote a blog and documented their experiences also in videos. |
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| JugendMobil - Germany |
| The project combines the improvement of mobility of youth (12-18 years of age) in selected rural areas with involvement of youth in the local and regional decision-making process. The project responds to the short and medium-term issue of complicated travelling from the rural areas in the Bundesland Brandenburg (DE) to regional centres with schools, hospitals and other public services and to the long-term problem of out-migration of youth. Some of the solutions proposed with young people’s cooperation have already been implemented through pilot projects. |
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| Coola Krafter & Coola Krafter 2.0 - Sweden |
| The project was implemented by the Terra et Mare LAG in Sweden and it represents an umbrella project with subprojects that targeted young people aged 13-25. They were able to apply for funding for their own rural development project ideas. The maximum of support for a sub-project is approximately 2 300 EUR, and there must be at least three applicants, one of whom must be at least 15 years old. Supported projects include music festivals, theatre productions, a musical, a music room, a beach volley field, starting of clubs (youth club, paintball club, and skate club), skate ramps and a youth café. |
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| Rural Youth Network Uland – Sweden |
| The project in Sweden was set up in 2006 as a network of youth coaches working with LEADER and as a venue for exchange of experiences, skills and developing competencies. The aim is also to further develop the position of youth in rural development in existing fora. The network lobbied successfully for making youth as a horizontal priority for the 2007-2013 Swedish RDP. Uland has also developed a toolkit [PDF] in order to engage young people in writing local development strategies. The toolkit is a part of the guidance material that the Swedish Board of Agriculture provides to all Leader groups and county administrations for the next programming period. |
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| “Featured space” - Austria |
| This research project focused on understanding how to improve quality of life in rural areas and make them more attractive in the future for young people as places where to live and work. Specifically the project was an attempt to find solution to limit socio-economic threats that lead to migration of youth from rural areas and consequently contribute to brain-drain, demographic decline and lower innovation. Together with researchers, teachers and stakeholders, pupils from the Alps Adriatic region - Carinthia in Austria; Gorenjska in Slovenia; Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy - developed scenarios for rural living spaces in 2025. This exercise resulted in in-depth research whose details were documented and disseminated with videos, through the website and other media. |
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| JuWel – Youth Network and Creative Workshop - Austria |
| This project, initiated by the LAG Wels-Land in Upper Austria, aims to strengthen the participation of young people in the local and regional policy making process while linking different regional, national and international youth organisations and initiatives. The project started in 2009 with a regional study and the creation of the youth network “JuWel” and in 2010 the regional youth conference “Youth Meet Politics” was organised and afterwards, annual creative workshops, which support regional youth initiatives, have been organised. As a result of these activities, so-called “Youth teams” were installed in three municipalities. They function as direct contact and knowledge hubs in relation to youth initiatives for local institutions. A handbook on addressing the needs of young people and enhancing youth participation was developed for municipalities [PDF  ]. Pre-existing youth initiatives now work together on a regional level on topics like activities for kids, sustainability, regional food etc. |
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