Inclusion is Fusion!

#Inclusion #homeless #mentalhealth #social #innovations Many people want to help but they are afraid to approach to the people in big need. For example, a homeless person, because his or her condition can be so bad, that you’d rather just look away. That’s understandable and there are as many reactions and sensibilities as there are people (and animals, even plants) on earth. First step is to acknowledge how you would feel when approaching to a homeless person, given they might not want help. Or they don’t want help from you, but would accept it from someone else. That doesn’t mean they can sense if somebody is a bad person : ) It’s just like that for some reason, you may resemble their much hated uncle etc. So try applying a “small pieces consist a big picture”, start with small steps. And there’s planning and team-work Small “yeses” leads to a bigger yes. Even if something disgusts you, like very poor hygienic condition of a homele...

Would you be an upcycler? The project StartUpcycling promotes youth employability through upcycling. 8 international partners worldwide developed methods and tools to show that upcycling can be a great tool to entrepreneurial learning, startup creation and waste reduction. Check out this VIDEO to get to know a few upcyclers. The partners developed a free online course that is available here: www.actione-learn.eu/startupcycling

Peter is an enthusiastic entrepreneur who discovered his love for agriculture only after having worked as a sales manager and having realized that there are more meaningful things to do in live. He is now managing our project partner UEZ, offering educational and entrepreneurial projects and producing biodynamic crops for the local community. He is passionate about bringing young people together, living for a sustainable future and talking about the success stories of his biodynamic gardening. He shares their idea about the concept of a Social Eco-Agriculture that empowers small-scale farmers in rural areas: The republic of Croatia is a touristic and agriculture country. Agriculture land is one of the main countries natural and economic resources and the structure of the land is not suitable for conventional agriculture but is perfect for ecological agriculture. Yet ecological grown vegetables for example, takes place to only 0,6 % of agriculture land. The small-scale far...

The German mountain equipment supplier VAUDE has followed the political call for integration in the labor market, employing 12 refugees. Meanwhile, all are incorporated and are socially integrated. Now, seven refugees might need to get deported. "We took responsibility and invested a lot of time and money. Now we should lose the workforce that we urgently need. It will be a great economic damage for us, not to mention human catastrophe. We no longer want to be the play ball for politics, "says Antje von Dewitz, VAUDE Managing Director. That's why VAUDE launched an initiative that in just a few weeks joined more than 80 companies and three associations from Baden-Württemberg. Together, they campaign for the right to stay for refugee employees with permanent work or training positions. This text was first published on www.unternehmensgruen.org and got translated by Teresa Wald.

We discovered a great example of "INFUSION" in Cairo: In late March,   a newly-established initiative called  Startups without Borders  gathered  around 200 women refugees at the American University of Cairo. The participating female entrepreneurs could  listen to each other’s stories and how each one of them was able to leave an impact in the societies she was moving to.  The goal was to support the matching of refugee and migrant entrepreneurs with available opportunities in order to help them launch and develop their startups. According to the  United Nations , Syrian refugees alone have contributed nearly $800 million to the country’s economy since the start of the Syrian crisis. Find out more in the article published by Wamda .

Here is a constellation of methods we implemented in a workshop with youth on "Sustainability": INTRODUCING SUSTAINABLE TOPICS The project group gets introduced to the different definitions and the meaning of sustainability. After a presentation about the definition of sustainability, the group will get to know challenges of sustainability and understand why it is so important to strive for sustainability. WHAT IS SUSTAINABILITY? Among many ways that sustainability has been defined, the simplest and most fundamental is: “the ability to sustain” or, in another way, “the capacity to endure.” [1] More than that, sustainability implies responsible and proactive decision-making and innovation that minimizes negative impact and maintains balance between ecological resilience, economic prosperity, political justice and cultural vibrancy to ensure a desirable planet for all species now and in the future. [2] It means, to be a sustainable has not just limited environm...

Inclusive gardens and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) A German study shows that gardening can contribute immensely to the integration of newcomers. In her master thesis, Alice Wichtmann explains that intercultural gardens can take on a variety of social functions: They are meeting places, exchanges, recreation and civil society engagements. They enable the growth of social, cultural and ecological diversity in a unique way and thus also promote the integration of newcomers ( ANU , accessed March 2018). Just recently, BBC wrote an article about the "healing power" of gardening and how refugees can find a new fulfilment, role or purpose in their new home town. And we, the team of INFUSION know that gardening can be a great starting point of setting up an own business. For example, following the example of Tania Jacobs setting up her own seed bank in Cape Town or Dijana Fabjan selling her own grown vegetables to the neighborhood through our Croatian partner ...