TACSO has released the report on the conference 'Keeping up the Momentum: Improving Cooperation Between Public Institutions and Civil Society in the Western Balkans and Turkey' on its website, along with the following text.


Over 100 representatives of public institutions, civil society, the media and donor community from the countries of the Western Balkans and Turkey gathered in Skopje to participate in the two-day regional conference Keeping up the Momentum: Improving Cooperation Between Public Institutions and Civil Society in the Western Balkans and Turkey.

The focus of the Conference was on the current regional and European initiatives to improve civil society cooperation with public institutions in the context of European Accession.

The Conference was organised as a platform for experience exchange and open discussion to provide a forum for presenting current regional and European initiatives and to improve civil society cooperation with public institutions. At the same time, participants from each country were able to identify the next steps they will take to improve civil society cooperation with public institutions during the next year.

The Conference provided an excellent opportunity for participants from different countries to exchange their knowledge and experiences.

During the opening ceremony of the Conference, participants were addressed by Ms. Karin Schulz - Director of Development Consulting, SIPU International AB; Mr. Jovan Andonovski - State Secretary, Government Secretariat for European Affairs; H.E. Ambassador Aivo Orav - EU Ambassador, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia; and Mr. Andris Kesteris - Principal Advisor Civil Society and Media, DG ELARG

“As a preparation for the conference, TACSO has carried out a study, which is a snap-shot of the current state of cooperation between the public sector and civil society in the region. This draft report, “Keeping up the Momentum: Improving Cooperation Between Public Institutions and Civil Society in the Western Balkans and Turkey”, fills a significant gap of information, providing an overall perspective of the challenges as well as the success stories of the region. The report, including the recommendations, will be discussed and tested during the conference and thereafter finalised.” – stated Karin Schulz, Director of Development Consulting, SIPU International during her opening speech.

This Conference was also the first in which TACSO organised a live web stream of the plenary sessions, while at the same time, the conference highlights and updates were broadcasted via social media - the TACSO Facebook page, and Twitter #KeepMConf2012. The footage, photos and more information about the Conference will be available on the TACSO Web page www.tacso.org.

The report can be found here: http://tacso.org/news/conferences/?id=8319