Under the Grant Competition announced on February 8, 2018, 23 NGOs were funded at the decision of the competition committee, for the following competiton topics

• Young voters and civic engagement in public and political (electoral) process
• Promote political parties’ electoral capacity development

Funded NGOs projects submitted for civic engagement of young voters are aimed at raising awareness of young voters, including youth with disabilities and ethnic minority youth, and promoting their civic engagement in the electoral process, enhancement of their theoretical knowledge, development of their practical skills and promoting the sharing of acquired experience. During projects implementation, as its contribution, the Training Center will train project beneficiary youth group as part of the competition - "Youth Debate Club 2018".

Funded NGOs projects submitted for promoting the development of electoral capacity of political parties, as well as facilitating the creation of competitive political environment, in general, envisage implementation of training programs for representatives of political parties, covering the following important topics, among others:

• Structure, management (international practice) and rights status of political parties;
• political culture in elections, debates and electoral ethics (professional, ethical standards and communicaiton with electoral stakeholders);
• Equal opportunities for parties and candidates in the election process (it is important for the module to include the following topics – access to administrative resiources and air/advertisement time)
• public relation mechanisms (it is important for the module to include the following matters, among others – media relations and the use of social networks, political and electoral PR);
• The role of a party in ensuring safe electoral environment;
• Internal party mechanisms for increasing women engagement;
• Managing personnel and volunteers (it is important for the module to include the following topics, among others – active citizenship and the engaement of youth in electoral process, developing regional offices).

In the course of the implementation of grant projects, the Training Center, as its contribution, will train representatives of political parties in the following modules: the rule of operation of the Election Administration, organizing elections (electoral cycle) and voting day; grounds and technique for developing application/complaint.

Funded grant projects will be implemented during the period of May 1 to August 31, 2018, and will cover all regions of Georgia.

Follow the link (available in Georgian) for information about NGOs funded based on the grants competition committee decision.