The participants of the conference were introduced with the activities of Koceni municipality (Latvia), where several active inhabitants together with the inhabitants of the twin city Vammala (Finland) have created the children’s play on the very topical issue, namely, the addiction of children to the computer games. The actors, young children from the local municipality, depicted the problem in Rabbit family, where the Rabbit Brother has the problem of computer addiction and his Rabbit Sister helps him by introducing with the Computer Worm. The Worm is usually very eager to eat children, who are only playing computer games and have forgotten how interesting it is to read books and play real games with the friends. Thus the fears from being eaten have encouraged the Rabbit Brother to discover the other possibilities of spending the free time not only together with the computer, but also with other young inhabitants of the wood!
The municipality of Valmiera can also be proud of inventing the new and creative method of how to bring together inhabitants of twinned municipalities. In 2009 the municipality has organized twinning days, where the central event was the jazz concert of “Twin Band”. Several amateur musicians from Valmiera and its twin municipalities have learned their parts in their respective municipalities and after having several common rehearsals they were ready to delight the inhabitants and guests of Valmiera city with their performance. This was also a good opportunity to introduce local inhabitants with the existing twin municipalities, showing that in the framework of twinning activities one can implement different kind of creative ideas!
Likewise, the audience had the opportunity to get acquainted with the initiatives of intermunicipal cooperation of Plunge municipality (Lithuania) in the social and culture field. Whereas, the representative of Pori municipality (Finland) has shared the best practice on how to facilitate the employment of local inhabitants, especially the long-term unemployed and youth.
The Conference was organized in the framework of project “Bringing Resources and Ideas for the Development of Local Governments of Europe” implemented in the framework of the program “Europe for Citizens”. The project is implemented by the Latvian Association of Local and Regional Governments in cooperation with the Association of Estonian Cities, the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities and the Association of Local Authorities in Lithuania. The aim of the project is to facilitate thematic networking and twinning activities in the Baltic countries and Finland, creating new twinning links and revitalizing the existing ones. The associations of the municipalities of Estonia, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania would feel, that the aim of the project is achieved, if we would see, that the stakeholders and those interested in twinning activities of our countries’ municipalities have discovered, that all our municipalities have the common interests, some new solutions for common problems and have the way forward for future cooperation!
