203 – Yenesis – YOUTH EMPLOYMENT NETWORK FOR ENERGY SUSTAINABILITY IN ISLANDS

Islands suffer from high unemployment throughout the year, with a seasonal peak on non-tourist periods, especially amongst young people – this is what the YENESIS project aims to tackle. We addresses the challenge of unemployment of NEETs between 25-29 years old in islands by creating green jobs in the areas of energy efficiency, renewable energy sources, sustainable tourism and sustainable mobility. Furthermore, embracing the Smart Islands Initiative and its principles of bottom-up approaches for innovation in islands, we put transnationality at the core of our project as it recognises the commonalities amongst islands around Europe and understands the potential of exchanging good practices, as well as joint endeavours. The YENESIS online platform that we have created contains good practices for youth employment shown through numerous success stories. The goal of the platform is to promote innovative practices for employment to the interested parties in order to adopt similar actions towards lowering youth unemployment. The platform is open to both NEETs themselves and investors or other stakeholders. Participants have the opportunity to share business opportunities, find partners, pitch their ideas, and collaborate. The platform will ensure the lasting effect of the project, attracting young professionals and entrepreneurs with similar interests and entrepreneurial ventures. As part of our project we have also developed the e-course consisting of the 4 main thematic areas of the project. It’s available in 7 languages: English, Greek, Spanish, Italian, Croatian, Estonian and Portuguese.

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