Through Green Roots we want to build a bridge between 36 youth coming from Italy, Greece, France, Slovenia, Portugal
and Bulgaria, living in different places but sharing the same values, care for the environment and passion for healthy
lifestyle. Project will be an opportunity to rediscover sustainable vegan recipes coming from our traditions and share them with others.
We decided to place as a core activities cooking workshops because food as a basic necessity of humans, and as everyday choice can create a big impact not only on our health but also condition of planet. Following the words of
Gandhi: “You must be the change you want to see in the world” we designed 11 days of a project to experiment and try first on ourselves, and then share with others good practices about how to live in peace with yourself, beings around and the earth. We want to boost and integrate the actions which we are making daily at home by sharing and exchanging them with other environmentalists. We believe that the first step to respect nature it’s respecting ourselves. That's the reason we connect the topics of physical and mental health, wellbeing, with environment and climate change. And to understand deeply our nature and synergy with nature we use art, handcrafts, yoga, jugging, dance, singing, painting, meditation and photography activities.
Our main objectives are to raise awareness of impact our daily actions and build sustainable and healthy habits. Increase consciousness about our synergy with the environment and spread veganism as sustainable, healthy cuisine. We create this Youth Exchange as a meeting point for diverse European cultures with the same values, where we can share passions and points of views and build collective identity. Know and bond deeply with people coming from different places, and come over the stereotypes. Promote healthy lifestyle, balanced diet, physical exercise, self care, self regulation skills and outdoor activity as an alternative way of spending time to avoid risky behaviour of abuse of alcohol and drugs and having an active role in the society.
We want to take care about every aspect of this youth exchange with a horizontal approach, by being directly engaged in the management of our community.

We are a group of 36 participants, the majority of us are coming from rural areas and or with economical difficulties. We are interested in a sustainable approach to life, we have passion for cooking, making art and self development. Members coming from Active Green Solution are environmental activists from rural areas around Serres. Willing to have international experience to develop green skills and become more active in the field of environment.
ESEI youngsters are interested in the ecological way of living with a passion for cooking and a healthy lifestyle. 75% of them are living in remote rural areas, for them it’s really important to meet people from other European countries to exchange experiences, dreams and values. Casa d’Adobora newcomers to European initiatives that have never left Portugal before and are willing to travel abroad, meet new cultures and interact with other youngsters.
Rakonto youth from remote villages of the Atlantic Pirenei area with passion about photography, sustainable travelling and ethical use of social media to spread positive green values. No Excuse participants with interest on participating more in the life of the organisations, they want meet new people and learn new activities, having experience in organising and leading workshops NDU 5 youngsters from rural areas around Benevento, half of them at their first European mobility, but all of them with passion about art and Environment wanting to participate in an international exchange, interact with young people from other realities and practice new green habits.
-Team building activities, we will dedicate the first two days to develop trust and sense of responsibility between participants, connect, bond, express our needs, expectations and commitment.
-Evaluation and Youthpass, daily activity to support process of self reflection, noticing own learning outcomes and monitoring the project from participant perspective.
-Creativity, art and culture: every partner country will prepare workshops in this theme to share important aspects of their culture. By this workshop we can become more familiar to the contemporary culture of the other countries from the perspective of the youts.
-International vegan Cuisine: workshop led by participants, in small international groups we will prepare traditional sustainable meals and enjoy eating them together.
-Food Photography: through documentation of food prepared during the international vegan cuisine we will acquire photographic skills and collect material for the final outcome.
-Open Art Space: we will explore different arts in an informal way, to discover and bost our talents and communication skills.
-Housekeeping, we will take care of our common spaces, make them home for our community, manage the shopping for the cooking workshops by using a project budget
-Environment and wellbeing workshops, to discover more about ourselves and nature, feel our place in the planet and raise our environmental conscience
-Selfmanaged shooting day, creation of videos with aim to grow awareness about the importance of our daily choice, the
format of the workshop will give us freedom of deciding, responsibility and independence.
- Erasmus plus possibilities, dreaming and coaching, sessions design to provide information about Erasmus+ programs,
give opportunity to participants to think about and plan their own project and for those who want to implement it, give
support from more experienced.
-Eat and Play, final event organised for the local community. It will be an opportunity to share our experience and transmit
values and results of the project.

The final outcome of the project will be Green Roots book, containing low impact, inexpensive, simple and affordable vegan recipes from Italy, France, Slovenia, Portugal, Greece and Bulgaria. It will include pictures and anecdotes prepared by participants. From this content we will create another publication Sustainable Kitchen for big groups, a manual for all the organisations who want to create environmental- friendly menu for local and international events, and supply recipes on a large scale.
Another result will be mural inviting the local community of San Martino to take action against climate change by building sustainable, daily habits and being aware of synergy between all living beings and nature.
Meaningful fruit of the youth exchange will be creation of an international group of youngsters which are promoting practices
for the health of the people and the planet.
Iimpact on participants We strongly believe that Erasmus + Youth Exchange can be a life changing experience. During the project we will stimulate ourselves to acquire multiple skills and various types of activities will give an opportunity to learn to participants with different preferences of learning strategies.
Cooking for a large group, managing a budget, cooperating with others, respecting timeframes, leading a group, solving problems and working to support someone else's idea. discover new areas of ourselves and empower our communication strategies. responsibility of choice, engagement, active participation and self listening. will practice technical skills, composition, using the light, and creativity. Opening new possibilities to involve ourselves in the activities of the organisations by having more skills and experience, by feeling also more confident Being part of an international community for 11 days, sharing passions, working for the same goals, exchanging point of views will reinforce the feeling of being europeans.
During the exchange we will know more about erasmus plus programme, Through this project we will improve active participation in the society, build and share healthy and sustainable habits, meet new people, get new ideas, explore different kinds of activities. It can give us the power to bring our life to act, to start studies (or continue it in a new light), to participate in other youth mobilities and social initiatives with the organisation to make important decisions for our future. Impact organisations For Nuova Destinazione d’Uso this project will enlarge the skills of the members. will multiply the area of our actions by involving youngsters from San Martino Valle Caudina and cooperating with institutions there, enlarge our European possibilities by cooperating with new partners.
Active Green Solutions will start to integrating art with activities of environmental protection For Rakonto it will be important enlarge their knowledge and skills about social and environmental issues Casa d'Abóbora will give possibilities to local youth to participate to their first exchange and bring activities that are missing in their area
No Excuse will integrate the cousin of their summer weekend workshops with more sustainable recipes and involve other youngsters in the cooking team .
ESEI will enlarge their international partnership, meeting new organisations which are developing activities in the same area of interest, learning approaches for working with young people, that can be used in future for local and international projects.
The book Green Roots will give visibility to all organisations involved, its dissemination will be a way to get in touch with other youngsters interested in the topics of environment and healthy lifestyle. Spreading the manual of sustainable cooking for the organisations will enlarge our contacts and open new possibilities of the future partnerships.
Impact for the out of the partnership
Book and manual will make the project visible also outside of the partnership, and will be a vehicle to spread our values and practical things which everyone can make to reduce our negative impact to the ecosystem, starting from our alimentation.
Through the book we will reach other youngsters and everyone who wants to have an ecofriendly approach to the food and through the manual we will give practical support to every organisation that wants to propose a more sustainable menu for their events, mobilities and festivals. We will reach 210 organisations.
With the mural we will spread our call to take action in our daily life to mitigate climate change and respect all living beings.