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Environment and Public Health in Nevinnomyssk and other Regions of Eurokhim Presence

News, April, 2007.

The Environment and Public Health in Nevinnomyssk and Other Regions of EuroChem Company Presence Program is Gaining Momentum

In early April 2007, donor representatives of the Environment and Public Health in Nevinnomyssk and Other Regions of Eurochem Company Presence Program
  - EuroChem Holding (Moscow) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) - and partner organizations of this Program –   Fund for Sustainable Development and Healthy Russia Foundation - arrived on a working visit to the city of Nevinnomyssk, Stavropol Krai.

During this visit, which was organized with the aim of monitoring Program activities, the participants went to project sites where they were received by organizations, winners in the first Program contest, conducted training seminars for project teams, and took part in a discussion of the future strategic development of the Program.

The delegation also met with the Working Group (WG) of the Program that was formed by the Nevinnomyssk City Administration to coordinate the efforts of donors, Program partners and the community. During this meeting, it was stressed that the social technologies of the “resource model” proposed in the context of FSD’s Program facilitated community activeness and involvement in regional development initiatives. The three-year community development model proposed for the consideration of the WK includes a variety of contest procedures: from separate projects to the formation of a consortium of partners with a pool of projects, to founding a local community fund. The attendees of the meeting acknowledged that to strengthen the potential of the local community it was important to only merely obtain funding for addressing local social and environmental challenges, but to participate in contests that give the community a chance to build up its “project culture”. 

The new approach of forming project consortiums was met with a favorable response on the part of officials from the City Education Department (L.Golovneva) and the Committee for Juvenile Affairs (N.Sizova), and the staff of the First City Charity (E.Koroleva) who discussed the possibility of developing  a complex of projects devoted to youth participation in the life of the city and filing a corresponding proposal for the next contest.

During this visit a press conference was held for journalists from the city and regional mass media (city newspapers: Nevinnomyssky Worker and City Ensk, the editorial board of the city radio station, the Stavropolye State TV and Radio Company, the regional newspaper Pravda, the regional issue of the newspaper Argumenty i fakty (North Caucasus), and the Teletext TV and Radio Company). The press conference was devoted to the results of the first six months of Program activities carried out by the first winners/participants: the city hospital, Lyceum #10, the city children’s hospital, Agricultural Lyceum # 11 and the local Young Natural Scientists Center.

Of special interest to the community were the meetings between the delegation and representatives of the city’s small and middle-sized businesses, public relations departments of large businesses (Arnest Open Joint Stock Company), city charities, regional government divisions and departments of the local government that brought together over 60 attendees. The Eurochem – USAID Program is a starting point of the process of building new multi-sector interaction and testing new forms of collaboration among socially responsible businesses, communities and government.

The Fund for Sustainable Development (FSD), which is managing the Program, conducted a training seminar for five winners of the 1st contest. At the seminar project coordinators, key implementers, and accountants from the recipients of assistance under the EuroChem – USAID social program became acquainted with program and financial reporting procedures and the required communications effort in support of all Project activities.  Experience in fostering broad citizen participation in addressing local environmental and social issues that is currently being accumulated in Nevinnomyssk is essential for the further dissemination of EuroChem’s social responsibility program in other regions of this company’s presence in Russia.

Officials from the Financial Department of the Municipal Government spoke at the seminar about the existing procedures of using non-budget funds allocated by organizations under “donation agreements”.

The next contest, this time for a complex of environmental and social projects of the Program, will be announced in Nevinnomyssk in June 2007. The experience of the winners in the first contest will be broadly applied in the course of preparing this new round of the local initiatives contest. 

	Members of the delegation visited the children’s hospital and outpatient clinic, which is the winner in the First Program Contest (“Key to Health” project) Left to right: E. Bondarchuk, Fund for Sustainable Development A.Ivanchuk, municipal government Yu.Kucherenko and a visitor of the outpatient children’s clinic with his child
	V.Lapin, coordinator of a project for introducing an energy-saving technique at the city hospital in Nevinnomyssk, describes the resource-saving activities carried out at the hospital’s kitchen
	On April 4, 2007, the Program’s development strategy was discussed at a meeting with representatives of the city’s business community, regional government divisions and municipal and public organizations. From left to right: R.Makushkin, chairman of the Program’s Working Group and acting Deputy Head of Nevinnomyssk City Administration; A.Kisilev, USAID Project and Program Adviser;   T.Yermolayeva, Director of the КСО Working Group and Lead Specialist of the Public Relations and Communications Department of EuroChem Company