21 April 2023 – A bicycle parking facility under the GoNM bicycle sharing scheme and an electric vehicle charging station have been set up to tackle dense traffic building up daily around the Novo mesto General Hospital area as part of the EEA Grants-supported project SALOMON.
The Novo mesto General Hospital area and its surroundings are facing traffic congestions, lack of parking spaces, low air quality and high noise levels. Over 20,000 patients are treated at the hospital yearly, over 190,000 examinations are carried out in specialist out-patient clinics on average and over 65,000 people seek medical attention in the hospital’s emergency department. Most of the patients and visitors, including 1,200 employees, use cars to get to the hospital.
Under the SALOMON project, the Novo mesto General Hospital, Novo mesto Development Centre and the Nord University from Norway work together as project partners to raise awareness of sustainable mobility options and spur change in travel habits. Their aim is to encourage hospital staff, patients and visitors to use more sustainable transport modes, such as public transport, car sharing, walking and cycling, to get to the hospital. As part of the project, a mobility plan is planned to be developed for the Novo mesto General Hospital.
Installation of the bicycle parking facility under the GoNM bicycle sharing scheme and the electric vehicle charging station brings project partners and the local community one stop closer towards the goals of the project. Norwegian project partners visited Slovenia to participate in the ceremony marking the official opening of the bicycle parking facility and electric vehicle charging station that took place on 18 April 2023.
20 April 2023 – TRIALOG, an online platform providing young people with all kinds of information about mental health and peer-to-peer violence to empower and mobilise them was officially launched at the expert meeting ‘’Young people and mental health – a long-distance race‘’ that took place on Monday, 17 April 2023 as part of the project TRIALOG.
Online platform TRIALOG
The newly created online platform TRIALOG has been designed for young people to raise awareness about mental well-being and improve understanding of peer violence and intimate partner violence in an effort to empower youth, help them easily recognise different types of stress (in themselves or in peers) and take informed action that creates real change. The online platform covers the following useful adolescent topics:
Peer-to-peer positive dialogue and support where young people give their own self-care ideas to those in need or share lived experience of violence and tips on how to mobilise local communities to work together to improve mental health;
Tips and advice on how to cope with stress and which steps to take to support mental well-being, including through various meditation and relaxation techniques;
Interactive content presented in an innovative and youth-friendly way: a quiz on recognising forms of violence and mental health myths and stereotypes.
Online platform TRIALOG
Expert meeting ‘’Young people and mental health – a long-distance race’’
The expert meeting that gathered both the expert and general public focused on the challenges, opportunities, potential solutions and good practices in young people’s mental health and peer-to-peer violence. The ever-growing importance of this topic has also been underscored by the recent case of peer violence that happened in Celje. The rising number of such events shows that existing prevention mechanisms fail to deliver and underlines the need to address the issues of young people’s mental health and peer violence at a systemic level.
The expert event brought together panelists that aimed to shed light on young people’s mental health and on the prevalence and impact of peer violence. Dr. Ksenija Domiter Protner, school counsellor at the Prva gimnazija Maribor high school; Tina Pivec, Master of Psychology and young researcher at the Educational Research Institute, Lara Mavrič, president of the student community and student at the Prva gimnazija Maribor high school, and project lead, Tjaša Rupar, discussed mental health issues that teens and young adults face today. They also touched on existing support structures and services young people can turn to to get help, identified good practices that can serve as inspiration, and identified systemic gaps and areas where there is still considerable room for improvement.
Project Trialog
Supported through the Norway Grants, TRIALOG has been developed as a response to the challenges young people are faced with in today’s world. Certain problems and stresses that covid-19 unveiled or made worse have remained part of everyday lives of many young individuals even now that covid-19 restriction measures have long been lifted.
As a consequence, poor mental health has been observed among young people, due mostly to rising anxiety and depression rates. Forced social isolation and lack of contacts during the pandemic have left many young people struggling with low self-esteem, reduced independence, social withdrawal and tendency to self-isolate. Material deprivation and deteriorating relationships, rise of peer-to-peer violence, intimate partner violence and domestic violence took an additional toll on mental health of many vulnerable young people.
TRIALOG is a project that fosters empowerment and mobilisation of young people and individuals who work with young people either on a professional or semi-professional basis, and has been designed to help young people cope with the emerging challenges of the new normal.
18 April 2023 – Programme Operator is publishing the answers to the questions raised by beneficiaries at the Workshop on project reporting for Slovenian beneficiaries, organised by the Control Unit. The workshop for project promoters and project partners implementing projects under the Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation programme and the Education, Scholarships, Apprenticeship and Youth Entrepreneurship programme took place on 6 April 2023.
17 April 2023 – The project called Koroška region Youth Support Network (KOR-NET project) addresses two development-related issues in the Koroška region, namely depopulation and brain drain. The project, worth almost half a million euros and funded by Norway Grants, has resulted in opening three workstations to activate young people in the Koroška region and to help them get even more involved in the local environment.
13 KOR-NET workstations for young people in the Koroška region
On Tuesday, 11 April 2023, the first workstation for young people in the Mislinja dolina valley, which is the third KOR-NET workstation for young people, was opened at the premises of the Slovenj Gradec Youth Cultural Centre. At the opening ceremony, the Mayor of Slovenj Gradec, Dr Matija Tasič, said: “If space is a problem, then we don’t have a problem. We want to see more active young people who will promote the youth scene in the municipality.”
Workstations are spaces for young people, which are equipped with computers and offer basic office supplies and materials, and free access to online services, information, printing, etc., which young people need for schoolwork, finding jobs and for job interviews, and areas where friends can work together in realising their numerous creative ideas.
Workstation. Photo: KOR-NET
Viktorija Barbič, representative of the project partner A.L.P PECA, said that “if we want young people to stay in the Koroška region, especially in its rural areas, we have to offer them all the support we can in developing their potential and actively involving them in the local environment.”
The idea to introduce workstations for young people results also from the poorer digital inclusion of young people in the Koroška region, which is more pronounced in rural areas. This is why the KOR-NET project aims to compensate for this shortcoming at least partially by placing the workstations in less dynamic environments where young people need an even stronger impetus.
13 workstations will be set up across the Koroška region. So far, workstations have been opened in Prevalje (at the Community Centre), Ravne na Koroškem (at the Regional Chamber of Craft and Small Business Ravne) and in Slovenj Gradec. By summer, other workstations will open their doors in different, more rural parts of the Koroška region, and thus help to further activate the potential of young people from all three valleys of the Koroška region.
The Koroška region Youth Support Network project (KOR-NET)
The Koroška region Youth Support Network project (KOR-NET) aims to strengthen the support environment for young people in the Koroška region, reduce brain drain and co-create, in cooperation with young people, a quality environment for life and work.
The project aims to give all young people in the Koroška region equal opportunities and a chance to get actively involved and participate in local decision-making, especially on issues that affect them. This will also help young people enter the labour market with more confidence and become more active citizens.
In addition to setting up a total of 13 workstations for young people across the region, the project will also result in setting up the Koroška region virtual youth incubator, in the design of a model for active participation of young people – a set of good practices in the field of youth work, and in organising workshops, camps and networking events for young people to connect with experts, decision-makers, entrepreneurs, etc.
Website of the future Koroška region virtual youth incubator
The project is co-developed by Dravit, which acts at the project promoter and which includes the Dravograd Youth Centre, and the project partners the Koroška Youth Cultural Centre Kompleks, the Slovenj Gradec-based Spotur Institute and the local Youth Cultural Centre Slovenj Gradec. The project also includes representatives of the business sector, namely the Regional Chamber of Craft and Small Business Ravne Ravne na Koroškem, the company A. L. P. PECA and the Norwegian partner Bjerkaker LearningLab.
7 April 2023 – Within the project Heritage School for the New Generations, on Monday, April 3, 2023 and Tuesday, April 4, 2023, a neurological testing was conducted among the 4th grade pupils during art classes at the Ivan Grohar Elementary School in Škofja Loka. The non-invasive testing recorded and compared in an innovative way, the emotional and cognitive response of children while studying regular material according to the existing curriculum versus the new lecture in the field of local cultural heritage.
Through testing, the cognitive response in the perception and processing of stimuli was measured using techniques specific to applied neuroscience to investigate the experiences of a group of pupils during different teaching methods. Information about the lived experience was obtained directly from the pupils, using the so-called electroencephalogram (EEG), which records the electrical activity produced by the brain to obtain information with high temporal precision. The prepared measurements were intended to observe changes at the level of: cognitive load, attention, degree of involvement and perceived well-being during the planned activities.
Neurotesting at Ivan Grohar Primary School in Škofja Loka. Photo: Nejc Vurnik
The testing took place in two parts, the first day was dedicated to testing the children during the regular school hour of art lessons; the second day was dedicated to the implementation of the school lesson according to the curriculum, but enriched with elements of cultural heritage. The experts of the Institute for the protection of cultural heritage of Slovenia have prepared a new teaching lesson for the subject of art lessons in such a way that the content of the lesson was given through the aspect and examples of cultural heritage from the local area. The lesson was prepared on the topic of the habitat of animals throughout the past, which the students interpreted in the field of architecture.
Neurotesting at Ivan Grohar Primary School in Škofja Loka. Photo: Nejc Vurnik
On the first day of testing, Italian neuroscientist Andrea Bariselli explained to the pupils how the brain works, what are the measuring devices and what is being measured. The measurement was completely non-invasive; the devices recorded brain wave responses as was explained to pupils by Andrea Bariselli » measuring is like placing the microphone in the middle of the football stadium«. The topic of how the brain works was very interesting to the children; with great interest, they most often asked what happens to the brain during sleep, do we always dream, why do we wake up at the same time, does the brain sometimes rest, etc. The testing itself took place in an efficient and fun way for the children and did not hinder them from following the lesson, as the main device (EEG) was easily moved between the students. The same testing took place in the month of March with 4th grade students at a primary school in Norway in both outdoors and indoors.
Neurotesting at Ivan Grohar Primary School in Škofja Loka. Photo: Nejc Vurnik
Testing of pupils during pilot implementation of the lesson with elements of cultural heritage was organized within the project Heritage School for the New Generations, funded under the Norway grants, with the participation of the partner organizations; Ivan Grohar Elementary School; Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia, University of Primorska – Faculty of Humanities; School Center Škofja Loka – Secondary School of Wood Engineering, Municipality of Škofja Loka, Norwegian partner Magma Geopark AS and the Association of Historic Towns of Slovenia acting as the project promoter.
The project, which brings cultural heritage closer not only to pupils, but also to teachers, aims to use a scientific basis to determine the conditions and methods for better understanding and learning of compulsory school curriculum through the inclusion of nature and cultural heritage in lessons. And also, to justify through the testing that learning in this manner is more interesting, meaningful and motivational. This kind of approach also encourages innovative teaching methods that benefit the teacher-student relationship. It improves the quality of education and at the same time directly encourages and contributes to the preservation of our natural and cultural heritage. The inclusion of innovative teaching methods that introduce elements of cultural heritage and traditional skills and knowledge for its renewal, both in the classroom and in nature, can significantly contribute to the improvement of the learning process itself.
3 April 2023 – A press conference on the project Heritage school for new generations was held in the wedding hall of the Municipality of Škofja Loka. The partners of the project presented individual activities, including very interesting neurological testing of children, which is currently taking place at the Ivan Grohar Elementary School in Škofja Loka.
The mayor of Škofja Loka Municipality, Tine Radinja, highlighted the effort that Škofja Loka Municipality invests in both the renovation of buildings and the promotion of cultural heritage. The project Heritage school for new generations is funded by Norway Grants within the Education, Scholarships, Apprenticeship and Youth Entrepreneurship programme and is worth almost half a million euros. Part of the funds, in the amount of €80,000, is intended for the new installations and renovation of the »Rotovž« a Renaissance building in the Town Square in Škofja Loka. The premises, which have been empty and without purpose for more than 10 years, will acquire new content and purpose in addition to the renovation.
The representative of the project promoter, Mateja Hafner Dolenc from the Association of Historic Towns of Slovenia, presented basic information about the Heritage school for new generations. The purpose of the project is to establish an inter-institutional environment and learning practices for a more planned education of young people about cultural heritage and its renewal at the elementary school level. The project is aimed at the development of new teaching practices for the integration of cultural heritage into curricula and programs in primary schools. The project also transfers the good practices of the Norwegian learning system in cooperation with the Norwegian project partner Magma Geopark AS.
Representatives of the project partners presented their work, where the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia and the University of Primorska (Faculty of Humanities) are jointly developing a new innovative method of teaching cultural heritage content with interdisciplinary connections in primary schools. The new programme is being implemented and tested at the Ivan Grohar Elementary School in Škofja Loka. In addition, the school will acquire a permanent display corner for cultural heritage and didactic aids, such as a learning chest, which will be produced and planned in cooperation with the project partner Secondary School of Wood Engineering – School Center Škofja Loka.
Because on Monday, April 3th, and Tuesday, April 4th, 2023, at the Ivan Grohar Elementary School in Škofja Loka, a pilot implementation of new lessons together with neurological testing of children’s emotional and cognitive responses towards cultural heritage teaching took place, the Italian neuroscientist Andrea Bariselli from company Strobilo was able to answer the questions about testing.
Ivan Grohar Primary School in Škofja Loka. Photo: Nejc Vurnik
He pointed out that through neuroscience we can obtain a large amount of data that can be used to improve, understand and predict human experiences and responses. Using an EEG (electroencephalogram) head device, the children were tested for their responses when the cultural heritage is introduced in the school lesson. The study will compare how the children respond during a ordinary school hour and an cultural heritage school hour.
29 March 2023 – Donor States, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway and Slovenia held the fifth EEA and Norway Grants 2014–2021 Annual Meeting, which took place in Postojna, Slovenia, to discuss the state of play of individual programmes, and to ensure efficient spending of the funds available under the EEA and Norway Grants.
In his opening address, dr. Aleksander Jevšek, Minister of Cohesion and Regional Development, said that he was delighted that Slovenia had come to a point of fully implementing all projects and programmes planned in the frame of the current funding period. “Indeed, the EEA and Norway Grants, in addition to the available EU cohesion policy funds, make an important source of funding that supports Slovenia’s development. I am convinced that all projects that are currently being implemented will, in the end, make a significant contribution to realising the set objectives and to making positive shifts in the areas that are of strategic importance not only for Slovenia but also beyond our borders. I am convinced that in the years to come, we will further strengthen our cooperation and continue learning from each other,” said Minister Jevšek.
Trine Skymoen, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Norway to Hungary, thanked everyone for the excellent cooperation and dedication to making the EEA and Norway Grants a success. She pointed out that the two financial mechanisms foster the continuation of fruitful collaboration between Norway and Slovenia. Kristín A. Árnadóttir, Ambassador of Iceland, also thanked everyone for the excellent cooperation and outlined the best practices of the past bilateral cooperation. She presented the areas Iceland believes should be supported in the next financial period.
Presentation of reports and the implementation of programmes
In the first part of the meeting, the Combined Strategic and Annual Report for 2022 was presented. The representative of the Financial Mechanisms Office presented the Active Citizens Fund, the programme Social Dialogue – Decent Work, and two horizontal funds, namely the Fund for Regional Development and the Fund for Youth Employment, underlining the importance of the cooperation of the Slovenian institutions. Programme Operator of the Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Programme and the programme Education, Scholarship, Apprenticeship and Youth Entrepreneurship reported on the implementation of both programmes and projects. The Budget Supervision Office of the Republic of Slovenia presented its work and the Audit Report. The representatives of the Donor States welcomed Slovenia’s progress over the last few months regarding the implementation of projects, inviting Slovenia to continue with the successful performance of projects.
The bilateral initiative Supporting the Green Start-Ups of Tomorrow, implemented in the framework of the Fund for Bilateral Relations by the Primorska Technology Park in cooperation with three Norwegian partners (Oslo Science Park – STARTUPLAB, Insj UIO and Park Hamar – Learning HUB), was also presented. The main long-term goal of the initiative is to find new ways to empower today’s youth to make full use of tomorrow’s opportunities by creating environmentally sustainable and socially responsible jobs.
In the second part of the meeting, three projects were presented. The representatives of the municipality of Postojna presented the local project Predjama Sustainable, which aims to introduce sustainable solutions and arrangements in the field of mobility. Currently, visitors to Predjama cause heavy traffic, which burdens and disturbs the local people and the environment.
The representatives of the Soča Valley Development Centre and the Norwegian partner Viken County Council presented the project ReMOBIL, which focuses on developing a model and testing six regional mobility centres. They also discussed why bilateral cooperation should be encouraged.
Representative of KUD Center 21 presented the project The Guardians of Rivers, which is implemented in the framework of the Active Citizens Fund. The project’s main aim is to increase public awareness about the importance of protecting natural and human environments, especially watercourses, and promote active citizenship in this field.
24 March 2023 – The University Medical Centre Maribor (UKC Maribor) hosted a presentation of the LFIA–REC project to introduce the recycling of rapid antigen tests for COVID-19 with the support of the Norway Grants. “In addition to innovation, the added value of this project is that it brings together the University of Maribor, the local medical centre and companies,” said Aleksander Jevšek, Minister of Cohesion and Regional Development.
One of the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic is the accumulation of large quantities of waste, including rapid antigen tests. The recycling project aims to reduce this waste by separately recycling the white plastic and the gold nanoparticles that make up the rapid antigen tests.
According to Martin Rakuša, project manager at UKC Maribor, their facility alone generated 1854 tonnes of waste in 2020, 276 tonnes of which was an infectious waste, and around 2000 rapid antigen tests per week. It is therefore important for the hospital to find a way to recycle as much waste as possible, Rakuša said.
Project leader Dr Rebeka Rudolf from the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Maribor said that once recycling becomes a reality, other healthcare institutions and individuals will be invited to collect used rapid antigen tests so that they can dispose of them in health centres: „At the moment, we incinerate these tests, which are considered hazardous waste. When we incinerate one million rapid tests that use gold nanoparticles for the markings, we throw away 0.1 grams of gold and 5,000 kilograms of plastic used for the cases. This represents an estimated value of €15,000”.
Her colleague Tilen Švarc explained that once the materials are separated, the recycled plastic can be used to make electrical wiring enclosures, while gold nanoparticles can be used especially in many cosmetics and optical products.
“This is an innovative project that follows the concept of the circular economy. It follows the objective of easing the burden on the environment, or the green policy, which is also a priority area of the European Cohesion Policy and the Norway Grants, therefore we will continue to work towards co-financing such projects in the future,” said Minister Jevšek in his opening address. He also stressed the importance of bringing together different stakeholders, both public institutions and companies: “In addition to innovation, the added value of this project is that it brings together the University of Maribor, the local medical centre and companies”.
According to Minister Jevšek, Slovenia has received around €40 million from the Norway Grants in the outgoing period. The Minister announced a meeting with donors from Norway next week, from where he expects to receive approximately the same amount in the next period.
In addition to the UKC Maribor and the Maribor Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, the project, which has a total value of just over 700,000, also involves the Faculty of Polymer Technology, the Institute of Metals and Technologies, and the companies Plastika Skaza, Surovina and Zlatarna Celje.
20 March 2023 – Every day over 3,500 people commute to Trata industrial zone. It is located just a few kilometres from the historical centre of Škofja Loka, a beautiful alpine town in central Slovenia. Around 94% of employees working in this industrial zone use their cars to travel to work daily. Thanks to the EEA Grants-backed project Trata 2.1, that is about to change.
An industrial zone fit for the 21st century
Slovenia’s industrial zones accommodate various businesses, including manufacturing, processing, assembly, and distribution. The presence of these businesses is critical for the Slovenian economy. And while many companies are taking steps towards being environmentally conscious, the industrial zones that host them, designed in the 60s and 70s, have not been built with sustainability or clean mobility in mind.
Cycling path towards Trata industrial zone. Copyright: iPoP
That is where the project Trata, an industrial zone for the 21st century – TRATA 2.1, comes into play. An exemplary public-private cross-border partnership is building and piloting a blueprint for companies to enable the change of their employees’ mobility habits.
“The idea has been ‘brewing’ in the head of Gašper Kleč, director of the Development agency Sora for some time. He saw a big problem in the fact that nobody is addressing the generators of mobility when talking about and planning sustainable mobility. This topic is usually dealt with on the local, regional or national level, but not on the level of businesses, although they are the biggest daily generators of mobility”, says Katarina Sladoljev, project manager at the Development agency Sora.
Industrial zone Trata. Author: Vid Slapničar. Copyright: Broad Reach
The partnership brings together eight organisations – among them a municipality, development agency, NGOs, and private companies – to combine their knowledge and expertise in addressing this shared challenge.
Common solutions for a shared challenge
The project’s overarching objective is to encourage employees of the three companies taking part in the project to change their mobility habits for more sustainable ones.
We want to promote change in a motivating, positive and obtainable way. We are encouraging the employees to choose sustainable means of transportation for their daily commutes, either active mobility, such as walking and biking if they live up to 5 km away from their work, or using public transport – buses and trains when they live further than that. At the same time, we know that a lot of people who come to this industrial zone live in rural areas that are not very well connected with public transportation, so we also encourage car sharing. We want to make the change as easy and painless as possible.Katarina Sladoljev, project manager at the Development agency Sora
The project is split into several parts, each of them serving a specific purpose that will help achieve their ultimate goal – increase the number of commuters choosing cleaner modes of transport by 4%.
During the first phase of the project, IPoP – Institute for Spatial Policies – one of the project partners, carried out a survey of mobility habits among the employees working in the Industrial zone Trata. The survey revealed that nearly 76% of employees use unsustainable means to travel to work, meaning they commute to work alone in their car. In total, the survey received over 600 responses, which will be used to define the specific needs of the commuters and, later on, measure the change in their habits.
In addition to the survey, IPoP organised focus groups in each of the companies. Their goal was to understand the habits of employees and identify informal ambassadors of clean mobility who would later be appointed as mobility managers in their respective companies.
Copyright: iPoP
The second part of the project is the most tangible. In this stage, the project partners are making sure the right infrastructure is in place. It includes building unfinished parts of the cycling path by the project partner Municipality of Škofja Loka. Meanwhile, each of the companies in the project will purchase several e-bikes to be used by their employees and build appropriate bike storage.
At the same time, project partners CIPRA Slovenia and CIPRA International from Liechtenstein are collecting the best international practices for promoting sustainable mobility in companies.
“We at CIPRA International have years of experience in the cross-border area of Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein when it comes to sustainable commuter mobility and supporting the modal shift. The project offers us the unique chance to discuss our measures and activities with experts from other Alpine countries and get new insights.” Jakob Dietachmair, Deputy Director at CIPRA International
“Our international partners are collecting best practices from companies who already have mobility plans in their vision or their business plan, and are implementing them. These practices have to come from abroad because there aren’t many of them in Slovenia yet. We need to learn what are the possibilities, decide what is relevant and applicable to Slovenia, and then propose that to the three companies in the partnership. We are looking for practical solutions. For example, the companies will purchase 45 bikes between the 3 of them. But how will we distribute the bikes among, for example,450 employees in one of the companies? What kind of rental system should be put in place? These are the kinds of questions that we need to have answered” says Sladoljev.
Identifying policy holes
Such a bottom-up approach to clean mobility is not always easy. In this case, project partners identified an issue that could hurt the project. According to them, an oversight in the new tax policy in Slovenia will discourage employees from changing to clean mobility as it favours only electric cars, but not electric bikes.
“In Slovenia, if you get to use a company car, it is taxed as a work benefit. Last year an addendum to the law was accepted that lifts the taxing of the benefit in cases where companies provide electric cars. However, that is not the case for electric (or regular) bikes provided by the company,” explains Sladoljev.
To remedy this, CIPRA Slovenia is working with the Coalition for sustainable transport policies and national institutions to update the addendum and make sure that any employee in Slovenia, who chooses a sustainable vehicle, will enjoy the same tax benefits.
Aiming for measured impact
All the research findings, together with good practices proposals will be put together into so-called ‘Mobility plans’. Each company taking part in the project will get a customised mobility plan that will be implemented with the help of appointed mobility managers.
The pilot project is set to run until the end of April 2024. But as important as all of the steps taken in the implementation, measurement of the impact will be critical for the success of the project.
“Our objective is to change the mobility habits of 4% of people working in the three companies that are part of this project. We will measure this in several ways. IPoP will carry out a follow-up survey, similar to the one at the beginning of the project, to see how the answers regarding their mobility habits have changed. But we all know that surveys are not always reliable – there is a difference between what people say they will do versus what they do. That is why they will at the same time analyse the parking lot video surveillance footage to see how the actual situation is changing, and physically count over-time increase in car sharing and such. This way, we will be sure of the project’s real impact,” says Sladoljev.
Copyright: Municipality of Škofja Loka
Exemplary cross-border partnership
A diverse partnership between the public and private sectors, a development agency and various experts in the field of sustainable mobility from different countries, and the desire to change the existing situation can make Škofja Loka one of the best Slovenian success stories in the field of sustainable mobility. And since climate change is not a localised problem, it provides one more solution that can be scaled and replicated in Slovenia and other countries.
“The Alps are particularly affected by climate change. Temperatures in this region increased at more than twice the global average rate in the last century. The challenges we see due to climate change are similar in all Alpine countries and do not stop at political borders. Only a well-coordinated approach (for example within the framework of the Alpine Conventions Climate Action Plan 2.0) can guarantee a good life in the Alps for all. Finally, not one alone can stop the climate crisis, everyone’s help is needed.” Jakob Dietachmair, Deputy Director at CIPRA International
“If this project is successful, it will prove that this approach works and that the companies should be investing in similar models. And if we do it in a span of a year and a half, others can probably do it even faster because we will be able to provide them with a replicable model,” says Sladoljev.
More information about the Trata 2.1 project is also available on the website of the financial mechanisms and on the project website. You can also follow the project on Instagram. You are invited to watch the presentation video (in Slovenian).
9. march 2023 – A new project story about Slovenia’s first Barnahus is available also on the Synergy Network website.
The SYNERGY network brings together governmental and non-governmental stakeholders from different countries cooperating to prevent and combat gender-based and domestic violence under the EEA and Norway Grants.
In May 2022, the first Barnahus opened in Slovenia. The Barnahus (Children’s House) is the leading European model for treating child victims of sexual abuse. A unique multidisciplinary and interagency approach brings together all relevant services thus preventing re-victimisation of children and providing a coordinated and effective legal response for all children.
The general goal of the project is to provide child-friendly justice in accordance with EU directives, and to improve interagency cooperation in processes and procedures concerning the treatment of abused children according to the Barnahus model. Abused children are the main beneficiary of the project Barnahus in Slovenia.
For more information about the project, click here or visit the project website, website of the Financial Mechanism Office or website of the Council of Europe.
