Since 2016, the South Caucasus Regional Office of the Heinrich Boell Foundation has been supporting Georgian Young Greens to organize Green Political Festival. "Green Fest" aims to spread green values within the youth, increase their political activism and participation and debate the most acute challenges of the country.
To accomplish the aim of the project the following objectives were set:
- Raising the awareness on green topics within the youth (social and ecological justice, gender, sustainable development, democracy)
- Reinterpreting the term “politics’’ and encouragement of participation in the decision-making processes by spreading the main principles of direct democracy
- Engaging young people in the contemporary cultural activities
- Delivering the problems of youth to decision-makers with the help of the invited politicians.
The two day event attempted to combine diverse activities: thematic and panel discussions on such topics as ecological and social justice, education policy, gender democracy and civic activism. Also, number of workshops, publication presentations and cultural events took place. Thematic debates covered the following topics: gender and feminism, ecology, veganizm, internet security, bullying, etc.
GreenFest 2017 took place in Tbilisi.
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In 2016 GreenFest was organized in Rustavi (industrial town near the capital city). The festival discussed number of political issues from the Greens` perspective, hosted non-formal discussions, workshops, sport and cultural events. Political festival was a good space for identifying the problems that are common for the young generation in Georgia and discussing the most acute social and political topics that are usually ignored by politicians and mainstream media in the country.
