Empowerment Buddyship for Poverty Alleviation – Understanding volunteer mobilisation, training needs and societal added value
▶Summary
The rationale for this project cooperation lies in creating more inclusive (local) communities, in which we learn how to bridge the social divide and work towards realising SDG#1 No poverty. The promising method of empowerment buddyship deserves further examination and better understanding of volunteer mobilisation, training needs and societal added value.
▶Objectives
The objective of implementig this project was to bring together various perspectives and interesting practices around buddy volunteering for the endemic poverty cause, in order to strengthen operational impact in the field and direct further research orientations.
▶Activities
- Desk research and analysis into existing literature, relevant practice examples, and partners' expertise and findings. - Series of interviews with experts from different fields, practice workers and beneficiaries (expertiental expertise). - Identification of potential relevant partner organisations for ideation and dissemination of knowledge (incl. full day workshop).
▶Impact
Research reports on : - Various identified key themes like volunteer recruitability, inclusion and exclusion mechanisms, the role of corporates/industry and education, and valuation of volunteer work. - Outlook on the role of civil society in poverty alleviation incl. opportunities and challenges. - Analysis of available operational data based on ArmenTeKort's buddy programme incl. volunteer profiles and conversion/success rates. Other results : - Knowledge sharing and exchange of ideas and good practices within network of relevant organisations - Increased mutual understanding of Belgium-Netherlands context factors and cultural aspects - Workshop photos, blog article, social media coverage, etc.