Russian-German youth cooperation is carried out in accordance with the Agreement between the Government of the Russian Federation and the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany in the field of youth cooperation of December 21, 2004.
In 2019 it was 15 years since the signing of the Agreement. In connection with this fact the Russian Coordination Bureau for Youth Cooperation with Germany and the Foundation for German-Russian Youth Exchange took the initiative to hold a special event "The Berlin Dialogue: 15 years of the Agreement in the field of youth cooperation between Russia and Germany – a story of success and prospects" with the participation of representatives of the ministries responsible for the development of Russian-German youth cooperation, deputies as well as representatives of organizations from Russia and Germany directly implementing youth exchange projects.
The event took place in the format of a forum with discussion platforms in the following areas:
- "Youth" (youth exchange),
- "Education" (school and professional youth exchange),
- "Sport" (youth exchange in the field of mass sports).
The main idea of the Berlin Dialogue is to unite the efforts of various actors (involved or interested in the implementation and promotion of Russian-German youth exchange) in order to maintain the achieved level of bilateral youth cooperation and ensure its further effective development.
The organizers of the forum: from the Russian side – the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, MIREA – Russian Technological University acting as the Russian Coordination Bureau for Youth Cooperation with Germany with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, the Embassy of the Russian Federation in the Federal Republic of Germany. From the German side the organizers were the German Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, the Foundation for German-Russian Youth Exchange with the support of the Robert Bosch Stiftung.
About 140 people took part in the forum including representatives of organizations from Russia and Germany implementing youth, school and professional youth exchange projects, deputies of the Bundestag as well as representatives of ministries assisting in the development of Russian-German youth cooperation.
The key results:
Within the framework of the discussion platforms of the Berlin Dialogue "Youth", "Education" and "Sport" the organizers of youth exchange together with deputies of the Bundestag and representatives of relevant ministries analyzed the development of bilateral youth cooperation since the signing of the Agreement and discussed the prospects for joint work in this area.
Based on the results of the discussion platforms the positive results of the implementation of the Agreement over 15 years such as: about 200,000 young people were able to take part in youth, school and professional youth exchange projects, about 700 youth organizations and about 500 schools were involved in Russian-German youth cooperation and organized youth and school exchange projects, cooperation between Russian and German partner organizations is characterized by diversity, the quality of methodological work and the depth of content of the projects being implemented were noted.
The main problems affecting the development of bilateral youth cooperation were pointed out:
- Insufficient funding, and as a consequence, the inability to support new partnerships and wider involvement of new target groups (for example, students of vocational colleges) in youth exchange.
- Existing organizational and financial conditions for the visa procedure.
The members of the Bundestag who were invited to the Berlin Dialogue emphasized their readiness to support the development of youth exchange.
The participants in the Berlin Dialogue as one of the options for simplifying the visa procedure proposed considering the possibility of introducing a visa-free regime for the participants in youth and school exchange for a period of 30 days.
Within the framework of discussion platforms it was proposed to more actively use the resource of partnership between cities and regions to develop youth connections, pay more attention to popularizing the possibilities of bilateral youth cooperation and conduct joint events to study and disseminate the Russian language in Germany and the German language in Russia.
