GCAP Czech - Learning Brief 2008

GCAP Czech: Česko proti chudobě - Czechia against Poverty

GCAP Campaign in Czech is represented by Česko proti chudobě or Czechia against Poverty, a coalition of 42 non-governmental organizations working on various issues, including humanitarian aid, development cooperation, environment, climate change, gender, fair trade and economic globalization. The coalition’s work is aimed at raising public awareness on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and put forward ten demands to Czech policy makers, including the call for a more effective, transparent and responsible system of development cooperation and continuous increase of ODA.

A coordination team, composed of representatives of coalition members, is responsible for planning, strategizing and implementing core activities. The main communication tool has been the campaign’s website.

The campaign objectives have been translated into advocacy activities, which include mass mobilizations, public events, media relations, publications and electronic campaign. The coalition is active in strengthening the dialog with policy and decision makers through seminars, round-table, face-to-face meetings and open letters. At the moment there are more than 3000 volunteers in the campaign database, who take part in seminars, culture events and sport activities. The main campaign activities organised during Czech Action Days in September, reaching out to ten thousands of people.

Since January 2005, the campaign has grown in size, scope of activities and public outreach. Number of cities participating at the national action days increased from ten in 2005 to over 25 in 2008. Stronger engagement in the regions help to spread out the message all over the country and create a sense of bottom-up decentralized campaign, supported by local people while keeping its presence at national level. Subsequently campaigns messages reach out more and more people, which are reflected in growing numbers of volunteers, supporters and events organized throughout the year.

The coalition is a unique mixture of organizations with diverse expertises and experiences, providing opportunities to approach development issues from different perspectives. The campaign is not only offering information but also concrete possibilities for public participation and showing new perspectives  that poverty is not only matter of money but is connected to way of life. Substantial changes cannot be left only to politicians without behavior change.

The coalition is continuously strengthened its working mechanisms. Efforts have been made to build technical capacities of regional coordinators through joint seminar with the coordination team, providing information and skills for organizing regional events. The new campaign materials focus on concrete opportunities for people to participate in the campaign and show different faces of poverty – in Czech and developing world. The coalition have also identified some areas for improvements, including developing professional messaging and visualization to attract greater attention, translating complex issues to simple messages and active relationship with media.

For more information about GCAP Czech activities, please contact:

Ondrej Kopecný
Email kopecny[at]glopolis.org
Tel. +420 272 661 132

Dagmar Trkalova
Email dagmar.trkalova[at]educon.cz

Website www.ceskoprotichudobe.cz