The 9th National General Secretaries (NGS) Forum in Brussels (November 21st-23rd 2022) has been an enlightening experience for the leadership of our movement.
39 participants and 32 national YMCAs represented by their NGS’s plus YMCA Europe and World YMCA leadership.
After three years unable to meet in person due to the restrictions caused by the pandemic, our main annual strategic and technical meeting for the NGS’s network took place again in Brussels, YMCA Europe’s seat.
The Forum had its first edition exactly 10 years ago also in Brussels with the purpose of providing a working space to monitor the implementation of YMCA Europe’s strategy and open new cooperation and programmatic opportunities within the European level.
NGS Forum in 2012
Starting with daily truly inspirational opening thoughts and devotions, the agenda of this 9th Forum included a session on the activation of Vision 2030 at world, regional and national levels led by the secretariats of World YMCA and YMCA Europe, followed by group work with proposals about the way forward on the implementation of the global strategy in our context.
Another important item was the reporting about the “Response to Ukraine” actions led by our Area Organisation, including updates about the collective fundraising campaign, the development of humanitarian relief projects for Ukrainian refugees and the recent contributions from private partners.
The meeting also included:
- detailed presentations about EU funding databases built by YMCA Europe with a focus on Erasmus +,
- an update on the Organic Governance manual with the new Movement Strengthening tools,
- the presentation of the Roots Peace Work Guidebook (available now in English, Croatian and Russian) and
- a reflection about the role of the civil society organisations in cooperation with the public sector provided by the former Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova, Mr. Ion Cichu as guest speaker.
As part of the programme, the NGSs were invited to join five different discussion groups on relevant topics for our Area Organisation such as Programme Groups, our pilot Master programme or next steps in adoption Vision 2030 including further alignment between World and Area organisations.
One of the highlight of this 9th Forum was the visit to Mundo J building, YMCA Europe’s seat, where the participants were invited to a reception followed by a dinner.
Thank you to all participants representing their National YMCAs, World YMCA Secretary General Carlos Sanvee and YMCA Europe’s executive team for an effective and inspiring meeting in Brussels strengthening our joint work and fellowship across Europe.
