EKO is happy to announce that one more amazing youth exchange has been successfully completed. The project “Cities of tomorrow” united 22 young people from Italy, Greece, Portugal and Spain. It was coordinated by the Spanish organization Ecolucion, and took place in Sevilla, Spain from the 20th of May to the 27th of May 2023. 

Aims & Objectives of the project

This project aimed to bring young people in Europe closer with nature and create a plan for a better and more sustainable living in our cities. Nowadays, people live more and more in big cities with a fast life full of anxiety, polluted air and a small amount of green spaces to calm their minds. So this project wanted to make a difference in young people’s perspective of a modern life in a big city, because they are the ones that can bring changes and hope for a better future.

More specifically the objectives were:

-Inform young people about permaculture and planetary boundaries

-Give them a chance to involve themselves with gardening

-Show the efforts that being made by local people and organizations in Sevilla

-Create fresh ideas and solutions for better life quality in the future

-Bring people from different countries with a common passion together in order to share their experiences and different realities and to foster intercultural dialogue and cooperation

Workshops & Activities of the project

During the project participants had many helpful workshops. From the first day the facilitators wanted to set a base and get to know their audience a little better in order to achieve the best outcome. So, they held a workshop on learning styles and did a personality test, in order each participant knows what to do and with what tools they access and process information. 

Next workshop was about planetary boundaries. In this workshop the team learned through documentaries and researches what are the boundaries of our planet, if they are crossed and how they affect their life and of course our planet. After that each team presented data that the have collected and held a debate. Permaculture workshop was next on our program, a workshop of what permaculture is and information about permaculture’s “brunches”. 

The last workshop was about natural disasters in comparison with natural hazards. After a presentation explaining the differences, each country presented the situation in their chosen cities and later on in mixed groups participants designed doable solutions for better cities in the future, which they made true after the end of the project. Also, many non-formal activities were organized and all of the participants were included. For the first activity and in order for all participants to get to know each other and get familiar with the place, the organization prepared a Gymkhana. This was a great start, because it helped create a connection between participants, it highlighted the importance of team work and fair competition. 

Another fun and group activity was a manual act in the urban garden of the organization, “Hands in the mud”. The participants actively helped with tutoring plants, shade creation and compost. An act that brought the team closer to gardening and inspired some of them to start their own garden. The project continued with two days of wandering around the town of Sevilla, where small businesses and inspiring projects were presented. Local artists, creators, sustainable mini markets and green spaces presented to young participants, to inspire them with their work and fights in order to maintain their spaces.  

The second trip was to Doñana National Park, a trip that aimed to present some of Sevilla’s traditions and a beautiful national park with many animal and plant species that participants had the chance to explore. A successful and fun project like that couldn’t close without evaluation and an intercultural dinner, where all of the participants presented their gastronomy, their dances and of course said their goodbyes with tears and a hope to see each other again soon.

An amazing opportunity and great experience for EKO’s team

Konstantina, Valianos, Eleni, Xenofon, Nefeli and Vasilis were the members of this amazing Greek team whom we really wanna thank for all their contribution and collaboration throughout the project!

As EKO, we are very grateful for that amazing opportunity given to them and we thank our partner Celia Parejo and all the members of the hosting organization for all their hard work and for creating such an impactful project! 

Muchas gracias – Ευχαριστούμε – Thank you