THE EXPL ORER

T H E ORGA N ISIN G T EA M

AGRI

T H E M EDIA T EA M

Pg 5

Pg 6

Pg 7

Pg 8

T H E CH A IRS' T EA M Pg 4

FEM M

CULT Pg 9

W H AT IS EY P? Pg 10

TA BLE OF CON T EN T S

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There is one special team that ensures the maintenance of academic standards on every EYP session. The team, which sheds light on every obscure issue, provides participants with necessary information and sets them on the right path to writ ing academically strong resolutions, the Chairs? Team.

Three mesmerising ladies - Ms. Nia Chigogidze, Ms. Natia Jokhadze and Ms. Tamta Tsveraidze will def initely enchant you with their knowledge, smartness and fantastic skil ls of leadership. The ,,Super Trio? is lead by ,,Mega Duo?-Mr. President Matte Dvalishvili and Mr. Vice-President Zurab Giorgobiani. These highly experienced EYPers are known to be some of the most worthy alumni of their generation.

The Inter-Regional Weekend?s President is himself a Board member of EYP Georgia as well, leading the Committee of International Relations and Alumni Platform, so, it would be fair to say that he holds a vital role in the organisation. Also, during the interview he proved to be an extremely creative person with interesting approach. Here is an excerpt of the interview I conducted with Mr.President:

Q: How does it feel to preside ,,Borjomi-Khashuri Inter-Regional Weekend??

A: Well, what could I possible say about that - great indeed! Taking into consideration the fact that it 's my f irst t ime presiding a session, feels like a lot of responsibil ity caring on my shoulders, but that's all the fun you have when accepting a challenge like this. I am more than glad to play my role in shaping this type of event into something bigger and more important, a consistent type of activity by EYP Georgia.

T H E CH A IRS' T EA M

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T H E ORGA N ISIN G T EA M

The nature of our planet is various and wealthy to have the f lying insects such as bees - the most hard-working and productive insects on the earth, known for their essential role in pollination. Borjomi-Khashuri Inter-Regional Weekend has its very own team of bees, the Organising Team of the session.

Extremely experienced EYPers, the Head-Organisers - Mariam Pagava and Tamuna Tchipashvili along with their loyal, energetic and hardworking organiser - Zviad Jolokhava, have worked for months to make the session unbelievable for each and every one of us.

Tamuna has attended 9 sessions and for the f irst t ime as an organiser she took part in Telavi Regional Session?13 and immediately fell in love with this role due to her affection towards creating and organising. According to her partner, Tamuna is a Cinderella of the session. The other Head-Organiser, Mariam, who was characterised as a passionate, inspirational and superbly marvelous person by her

co-workers, is a skilful EYPer, who has attended 13 sessions from which in vast majority of the events she was in charge of organising aspects.

As for Zviad, it?s his f irst t ime to be an off icial and from the very f irst session he wanted to become an organiser, due to his love of order. As he believes that dil igence and ambitiousness play key role in achieving goals. Zviad is aiming to preside an EYP session. So, be prepare yourselves to meet him as a president in a few months' t ime!

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How can we capture the moments throughout the session and keep them once the session is over? The answer is: by the session video, issue and many funny, awkward, yet beautiful photos, which fully represent all of the moments we experience during the session. Wondering who is in charge of capturing all of these memories and creating the memory vault for you? The Media Team, the most inspiring and creative team of the session. The Media Team is lead by an Editor of the Weekend, who at the same time tends to be the President of EYP Georgia - if you didn?t know her before, you should definitely use the moment and get acquainted with Ms. Mariam Demetrashvili, whose contribution to EYP Georgia cannot be described with words.

As for the journalist, who is another member of the Team, which happens to be consisted by only two members, is Ms.Gvantsa Dolbaia. She is one of the most enthusiastic and hard working EYPers with complete commitment to her work ethics.

1. While being a delegate, what did you prefer doing on GA-writ ing speeches or debating? Mariam: Delivering Attack and Defence Speeches definitely.

Gvantsa: I enjoyed writ ing Sum-up speeches!

2. Your favourite TV-show character.

Mariam: Don?t want to leave wrong impression on

readers, but Tywin Lannister from the Game of Thrones.

Gvantsa: Arya from Game of thrones.

3. If you weren?t Georgian, then who would you be?

Mariam: German, for sure. I?m overly punctual. Gvantsa: French, indeed!

4. What do you think what will you be doing after 10 years?

Mariam: Working in a Transnational Company in Marketing?s Department.

Gvantsa: I guess I will be in university studying on PhD.

5. What would be your advice to the delegates of ?Borjomi-khashuri Inter-Regional Weekend??

Mariam: Set yourself a goal you want to achieve on the session and put as much effort into your work as you can. Effort is really the key component of the cycle of success, because even if you are inspired, motivated, or determined, you will not succeed if you don't put in the effort. Effort is the last step of the cycle before accomplishment.

T he M edia T EA M

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Statistics happen to be proving the same: only 17 out of 150 Members of Parliament are women, therefore, only 10% of women are represented at the municipal executive bodies. Existing measures to deal with gender inequality in Georgia, including the ones in both, nongovernmental and governmental sectors, aren?t working properly. As nowadays our country has no actual framework to balance the gender in the leadership positions.

The EU Member states have come up with diverse solutions including Quota System, which guarantees women to taking over higher positions at work and ?Golden Skirts? system which also solves the problem.

T he Commit tee on W omen's Rights and Gender Equalit y

If we want Georgia to meet the criteria of Association Agreement required by the European Union, the protection of gender equality along with other basic human rights should be guaranteed. This demand implies to the fact, that as long women face violence and discrimination our efforts to eliminate poverty, achieve equality, and advance human rights and democracy will not succeed. Unfortunately, Georgian conservative stereotypes, sexism and hidden discrimination make it almost impossible for women to apply for the quality positions. Low rate of women?s representation on quality positions at work places has become one of the main issues for our country.

For example Sweden-one of the Member States, approves existence of Paternity leave together with the Maternity Leave, which means that employed father is also obliged to take the day-offs in order to raise a child.

To sum-up, increasing women?s representation in polit ics is essential for gender equality. As gender equality is more than a goal itself . It is a precondition for meeting the challenge of reducing poverty, promoting sustainable development and building good governance.

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T he Commit tee on A gr icult ural and Rural A ffairs

  Agriculture plays key role in providing people with food, f iber, bio-fuel and medicinal products used to sustain and enhance human life. With growing urbanization, natural cataclysms and extremely unstable economics, answering the demand of the cit izens? of our country in regards of food and stability is becoming harder.

    One of the main issues in agriculture is lack of knowledge in the aspects of farming with low rate of interest in agricultural sciences, even though the last mentioned one is highly recommended and supported by the government. Besides, majority of students, who leave their vil lages aren?t coming back, which results in depopulation in some areas.

   Moreover, Georgian farmers have low output and at the same time Insurance companies prefer to work with bigger organisations and entrepreneurs rather than individual farmers. Georgian farmers are at stake of losing their harvest every year. Thus, farmers are dealing with worst conditions in case of any harm. Additionally, one more obstacle arises while regarding product quality and implementation of European standards in local agriculture and farming- every single product produced in Georgia should be approved by the International Organization of Standardization (ISO).

These problems need to be tackled by new reforms and fundamental changes that come alongside with communication between people and government. So let?s rely on the delegates of committee on rural and agricultural affairs and wish them good luck!

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T he Commit tee on Cult ure and Educat ion

" Educat ion is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world".

                                 Nelson Mandela

Getting education is the primary step to explore yourself-realize which profession you want to wield and what kind of steps should be taken in order to integrate into society. The right of education is a part of basic, social rights, which enables everyone-without any kind of discrimination, to get adequate education. However, in some countries, there is not equal access to educational resources. Unfortunately, Georgia isn?t an exception.

Georgian government, which plays key role in educational system, is unable to provide high quality education in schools, which means that not all students have equal access to educational resources like academic and extracurricular programs, strong teaching, facil it ies, technology, and instructional materials. According to the latest reports, Georgia is ranked to be 105th out of 148 countries according to the quality of education, despite it being 32nd in category of access to primary education. The school system greatly suffers due to low qualif ication of teachers and principals. The main cause of this is the lack of training. Moreover, a change in the quality of education requires reforms that are more harmonized and systematic. These kind of implementations are especially hard because of the changing polit ical interests that affect the above mentioned f ield and low monitoring of the of reforms developments. Educational institutions need to be supported by Georgian government. This statement poses up a question: What kind of support is needed? The answer is lying beyond the unanimous team of CULT!

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W hat is EY P?

European Youth Parliament ? EYP is a unique educational project which encourages young people with dif ferent cultural backgrounds and nationalit ies to get involved in creating European youth policies, sharing ideas in order to solve the problems Europe and the whole world is facing today. Nowadays EYP represents the network of the 42 European Countries and 42 youth organisations, activit ies of which more than 30 000 young people are actively involved in.

The typical activity of EYP is a session, in which delegates are allocated to the committees analogical to the committees of the European Parliament. Committees write resolutions, which are being discussed during the general assembly, f inal part of the session.

During the session a huge role is played by the heads of the committees, who direct the committee works, to make sure it follows the EYP methodology. They give directions to the delegates, in order to collaborate on the resolution and lead their committee activit ies during the general assembly.

The group of journalists and the editor are also selected for the session. At the end of the every day, they produce the issue of the newspaper of the session and at the end of the session they make a f inal video-collage.

The most important participants of the session, the delegates are the ?ideologists? of the session as the resolutions are created according to their ideas. Delegates present and defend their resolutions on the general assembly. They are the main f igures in the voting procedure, where they decide whether to vote in favour or against the other resolutions.

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T he M edia T EA M of t he Bor jomi-K hashur i

Inter -Regional Weekend

M ar iam Demet rashvili

Gvantsa Dolbaia