The 1^st Edition of the GSEF Global Youth Camp for SSE

Sponsored by the City of Seoul and jointly organised with GSEF, iCOOP, HBM, MTA, Underdogs, CHNGR and Happy Coop Tour, the 1^st edition of GSEF Global Youth Camp for SSE successfully took place from 22^nd to 25^th of August in Seoul and Gurye, South Korea. For four days, over 100 youth social economy actors from 25 different countries identified current social challenges and discussed ways of resolving the problems through seminars, on-site workshops and working group discussions facilitated by the co-organisers of the camp. The camp was a follow-up effort of the GSEF 2016 Montreal Declaration (Resolution No.6: Recognise and support youth as important actors for the future of the SSE movement).

On the first day of the camp, in plenary I, youth representative panellists from various sectors ranging from the social enterprise (Korea), cooperative networks (South Africa), student networks (Canada) explored potentials of SSE in generating positive impacts on our community. Also, participants engaged in on-site workshops in the field of social innovation, social financing, housing cooperatives and urban regeneration. Throughout the first day of the camp, participants were able to acquaint with other participants from diverse backgrounds and to work in various spectrums of social economy initiatives.

<Plenary I: Action of Youth: Changing the Society through SSE, 22 Aug, Seoul City Hall>

From the second day of the camp, all programmes were offered in Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP, which is one of the biggest consumer cooperatives in Korea. In the plenary II session, young social entrepreneurs shared their experiences of leveraging social entrepreneurship. Four panellists from the UK, Australia, India and Korea shared their stories of empowering local communities and engaging with social movements through various initiatives.

<Plenary II: Case Studies: Young Social Entrepreneurs, 23 August, Gurye>

After the plenary session, all participants were divided into five thematic working groups according to their interesting topics such as decent work (I and II), housing, social finance and the local community. Throughout the facilitated working group discussions, participants were able to understand the topic better and exchange their experience with other participants of the working group who are working in or planning to engage in the sectors.

<Elective Session I: Working Group Discussion, 23 Aug, Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP>

<Elective Session I: working group discussion, 23 Aug, Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP>

On the second day of the camp, all youth participants visited the Korean temple ‘Hwaeomsa’ and then get to know more about other participants through 'Culture Night' event.

<Hwaeomsa Temple visit: 23 Aug, Gurye>

<Culture Night opening by Phare, the Cambodian Circus, 23 Aug, Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP>

<Global Culture Night, 23 Aug, Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP>

On the third day of the camp, whole camp programmes were offered by different groups to deepen the understanding of the topic as well as about their group. Also, there was a chance for all the participants to explore one of the largest consumer cooperatives in Korea, iCOOP’s production facilities to learn about how consumer cooperatives can produce and distribute organic food while supporting local farmers for the benefit of consumers. In the evening, participants teamed up with participants outside of their working group to engage in a group project called ‘Birthgiving’ to come up with innovative projects to change society.

<Birthgiving Activities, 24 August, Gurye Natural dream Park of iCOOP>

On the last day, all youth participants’ wrapped up past three days of discussions and contributed to writing up the Global Youth Declaration which identifies current challenges for youth and how to promote SSE as a means to overcome the hurdles and make positive changes in our society. You can read the full youth declaration here.

* All photos were taken by photographer Sangjun Kim (toryya@naver.com)