Connect!East/South/West Women for Development
Linking women for EU-wide gender sensitive development cooperation
Connect! is a pioneering initiative aimed at supporting women’s organisations and NGOs in New Member States(NMS) of European Union: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia to influence and hold their government to account by demanding full implementation of EU policy on gender equality and women’s empowerment in their development assistance programmes. It also encourages the development and consolidation of new South/East/West perspectives on women’s rights, gender equality and development.
The Connect! Project is a three-year project partly funded by the European Commission, aiming to build linkages between women’s organisations (and long-term partners of One World Action) in Southern Africa and NGOs in NMS. One World Action and KARAT Coalition, a network from Central and Eastern Europe with its Secretariat based in Poland, are jointly co-ordinating the Connect! East/South/West Women for development project. We are working closely with KARAT’s member organisations:
The National Association of Human Resources Specialists (AUR), Romania
Gender Education, Research and Technologies (GERT), Bulgaria
Gender Studies o.p.s. and The Association for Equal Opportunities, Czech Republic
Slovak Center for Communication and Development (SCCD), Slovakia
The project seeks to establish a strong EU-wide constituency for gender-sensitive and responsive development cooperation. Activities include creating spaces and opportunities for exchange and sharing between women from Southern Africa and Eastern Europe, developing documentation for awareness-raising and capacity-building in the forms of policy and media briefings, web resources and raising media attention with public events and activities.
For more detailed information on the Connect! East/South/West women for development, you can download the Project leaflet in English, Polish, Bulgarian, Slovak and Czech.
You can also view our new publication on Development cooperation and gender equality in New Member States of the European Union, here.
KARAT is a regional coalition of organisations and individuals that works to ensure gender equality in Central & Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, monitors the implementation of international agreements and lobbies for the needs and concerns of women in the Region at all levels of decision-making.
You can access KARAT website here
Romania
The Organisation “AUR” – A.N.S.R.U is a professional non-profit and non-governmental organisation that aims to promote the concept of „human resources” in Romania. Human resources management means approaching the needs of all professional categories, to inform and educate people in the spirit of national and internationally recognised rights, to intermediate the social dialogue among all the social actors.
You can access AUR -Org website here
Bulgaria
Gender Education, Research and Technologies Foundation (GERT) is a non-profit, non-profit, non-governmental organisation, acting in public interest and in line with the international law to which Bulgaria is party. The mission of GERT is to initiate and implement, independently or in partnership with other NGOs activities targeted to enhance gender equality and social & gender justice in all spheres of social life, including access to and benefit from new technologies.
You can access GERT website here
Slovakia
Slovak Centre for Communication and Development (SCCD) is a non-profit 
organisation that focuses on general beneficial services in the area of creating, preservation, revival and presentation of spiritual and cultural values as well as in area of research, development of scientific, technical and information services.
You can access the SCCD website here
Czech Republic
Gender Studies, o.p.s. performs the function of information, consultation and education centre in the area of relations between women and men and their position in society. The goal of the organisation is to gather, analyse, work with and disseminate further information related to gender-relevant issues. GS actively influences change concerning equal opportunities in different areas such as institutional mechanisms, labour market, women’s political participation, information technologies etc.
You can access Gender Studies website here
This project is is implemented with the financial assistance of the European Union.
