The Regional Director for Youth announced in São Mateus that the Government has an ongoing process designed to validate the skills of youngsters engaged in volunteering.
Bruno Pacheco spoke at a press conference for the presentation of an environmental volunteering programme promoted by the environmental association Gê-Questa, starting tomorrow, and added that this validation process is already available in some European countries.
According to him, the idea is to adapt this procedure “to our reality through the collaboration of governmental departments supervising the validation of the skills acquired” in volunteer projects.
The Regional Director urged youngsters to consider volunteering “as an asset for life.”
Regarding the project that begins tomorrow, involving youngsters from various islands as well as youngsters from seven countries, Bruno Pacheco said that these meetings “are productive as they allow the exchange of experiences and realities, providing an important moment of informal education.”
The Regional Director said he hopes that more associations and more youngsters from the archipelago join volunteer projects that already exist or develop themselves innovative activities and reminded the youth volunteer programme launched by the Azorean Government about a year ago.
The Gê-Questa project involves about dozens of national and foreign youngsters, who will render voluntary service in areas such as environmental awareness-raising, nature conservation, eradication of invasive species and organic farming.
Youngsters from Mainland Portugal, Spain, Czech Republic, France, Italy, Germany and USA will pay the travel expenses to Terceira Island while the Regional Directorate for Youth will provide accommodation at the Youth Hostel and pay the inter-island travel expenses for youngsters from São Miguel and Pico.
Food expenses will be supported by local councils and private entities; there is even a fisher from São Mateus, the village where Gê-Questa is headquartered, who offered fish to the organisation.