In the Digital Transformation (DT) era, an issue that has affected society is how digital is modifying daily cultural life. Advocates and opponents debate on this topic and how the new cultural sector of professionals could be framed correctly.

For this reason, many initiatives have been launched to prepare people to address promptly this new challenge. However, many people would like, but they can’t have adequate training in the digital field.

The CHRACK LAB Bari – OFFICINE DI CULURA, a start-up born as a response to the national strategic initiative promoted by the Minister for technological innovation and digital transition and coordinated by the Department for digital transformation, contributes to this sensibilization path. Furthermore, Caritas, an association intensely involved in the social promotion and safeguard in assisting the needy, would promote an initiative to affect a particular target of people – NEETs (Not in Education, Employment or Training) in a European inclusive net.

For this reason, the CHRACK LAB Bari, in collaboration with Young Caritas Altamura[1],  EGInA s.r.l.[2] and D.A.BI.MUS. s.r.l.[3] is launching a project titled SOCIAL HACKADEMY BARI (SHB).

The initiative launched in December 2021 is moving on. It includes five introductory courses, starting from February:

• Web Design
• Graphic and visual design
• Digital Storytelling
• Podcasting
• Social Media Management

Moreover, some webinars on peculiar arguments have been thought to deepen digital knowledge.

Based on the competencies acquired, participants divided into teams will realize some projects to compete in the final event in July, a three-day Hackathon hosted in the University of Bari Aldo Moro. The project that is better designed will be prized.

We strongly believe that this initiative could promote digital awareness in people who probably don’t consider digital as a chance to find their place in the labour world.

[1] https://caritasaltamura.it/2021/11/11/nasce-young-caritas/, (last consulted: 13/12/2021).

[2] http://www.engagegame.eu/egina-srl-it/, (last consulted: 13/12/2021).

[3] https://www.dabimus.com, (last consulted:13/12/2021).

Before jumping into the mini hackathon, our coordinator Borut Cink presented the policy recommendations based on the feedback and overall experience of the project. These recommendations are multidimensional and touch on both the implementation of the training courses and Social Hackathons as well as the transferability of the Social Hackademy Labs. We can’t highlight all of them here but some of the key recommendations are:

• Organise the training courses and Social Hackathons in a face-to-face format
• Adjust the lengths of the training courses based on the learning curve
• Host a short collaboration session before the Social Hackathon
• Ensure that cooperation with civil society organisations is formalized
• Identify any training needs trainers may have and include these in the train the trainer activities
• Identify obstacles young people participating in the Social Hackademy Labs are facing and support them with so that they can have equal and meaningful participation in the Social Hackademy activities

The full policy recommendations in English are available here. The translations to Croatian, Greek, French and Italian will follow in January 2022. We invite you to check back regularly to find them in full.

Next in the event was a mini hacking activity! We could not give a full Social Hackademy experience as that would require weeks of training but we were able to give all our attendees a mini hackathon. We chose two Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for this activity: SDG 3 and SDG 4. The participants were split into breakout rooms with each focusing on one of the selected SDGs and went through the Social Hackathon process with a facilitator. All in all, the participants were excited to be able to go through this process and experience firsthand how this could be relevant in their own organisations.

Miro boards we used for the mini hack activity are open and available to everyone. You can explore them as following:

– Introduction to the mini hack
– Mini hack on SDG number 3
– Mini hack on SDG number 4

We invite you to watch the recording of the event below.

00:00 Introduction to the event by Ilona Kish, Director of Public Libraries 2030
01:36 Welcome remarks by Peter Palvoglyi, CEO of ALL DIGITAL
04:26 Opening speech by MEP Moritz Körner
10:09 Presentation of policy recommendations by project coordinator Borut Cink from ALL DIGITAL
33:52 Introduction to the Social Hackademy Mini Hack by Bianca Bisiach from EGINA
42:46 Presentations of the results of the Mini Hack by Linn Rasimelli and Bianca Bisiach

Focusing on the impact of the Social Hackademy in Croatia, France, Greece, and Italy, this event dives into policy recommendations to support the implementation of the Social Hackademy’s inclusive and collaborative educational methodology and bringing together policymakers, local authorities and education providers, this event is a great opportunity to learn about the Social Hackademy project and take part in a mini hack!

The event is co-hosted by MEP Moritz Körner (Renew).

Join us to find out how you can kickstart your own Social Hackademy!

Event programme

16:00-16:05 Welcome and introduction to the agenda
16:05-16:15 Opening speech of the event
16:15-16:30 Presentation of #hackAD policy recommendations
16:30-17:25 Mini hack workshop
17:25-17:30 Closing of the event

Social Hackademy Labs are grass root laboratories that utilize co-creation methodology for empowering young people with digital and transversal skills while developing digital solutions for various issues on local, national, European or global level.

The Labs are a manifestation of Social Hackademy Methodology which was developed with a support of Erasmus+ programme of the European Union. The Labs feature training courses on digital skills and Social Hackathons.

The Social Hackademy Award 2021 was organized during the Social Hackademy International Conference that took place on 15 October 2021 during ALL DIGITAL Summit 2021.

The Social Hackademy Award 2020 was awarded to Team Alimenta #Zerohunger2 from Italy.

The winner was selected by a special jury panel composed experts in digital skills development, ICT, social entrepreneurship, co-creation processes and project development. The jury panel members for Social Hackademy Award 2021 were: 

– Alessia Sebillo, Executive Director at Diesis
– Alexander Knoth, Chief Digital Officer & Head of Section Digitalisation at German Academic Exchange Service
– Barbara Quarta, Chief Programme Officer at ALL DIGITAL
– Milan Stajčić, Advisor for Development of Digital Services at Out of the Box International
– Tiana Zignani, Programme Officer at Public Libraries 2030

Four teams competed for the Social Hackademy Award 2021 were:

1. Winner of the Social Hackathon Rijeka (Croatia)

Team name: IT Girls

Team members: Marija Siladjev, Lana Prar

Short description of the solution:

Mobile app Fenix App – Mood Tracker aims to help people with different mental difficulties to keep track of their moods and activities that led to these moods in order to help them focus on the positive. It also provides tips and has additional options that allow users to achieve and maintain a state of remission and mental stability.

2. Winner of the Social Hackathon Montpellier (France)

Team name: Feminist Surge

Team members: Nicolas Prodhomme, Sarah Truffert, Roxane Cabit, Fatima Melkaoui, Julien Pablo and Violeta Rodríguez Porras

Short description of the solution:

The team developed a website that offers information, guidance, advice and support for people that are victims of violence and/or social exclusion because of their gender, minority status, identities and age in city of Montpellier. In addition to that, the website used by local collective called #NousToutes34 also support the work of the collective by providing directory of supporting structures (legal and psychosocial, medical), Lien Hello Asso (fundraising link) and membership site.

3. Winner of the Social Hackathon Patras (Greece)

Name of the team: The Coding Gang

Team members: Lazarinis Lefteris, Kostaras Fotis

Short description of the solution:

The Coding Gang has created an application to help the environmental problem caused by weeds destroying the local flora. The application has three main dimensions.

First, it informs the user about problems that have been identified near their location. It detects the user’s location and displays markers on a map with nearby problems. Clicking on a marker displays a brief description of the problem.

The second dimension concerns the user’s ability to inform the environmental organization of the existence of a problem. The application allows the user to take a photo and a video of the problem and email or post them along with some description of the problem and the location.

The last option displays general information about the purposes of the environmental organization and about the problem that the application deals with.

4. Winner of the Social Hackathon Umbria (Italy)

Team name: #Zerohunger2

Team members: Andrea Emili, Giacomo Torti, Scharon Torretti, Alberto Fecchi, Alessandro Masci

Short description of the solution:

Project Alimenta’s objectives are to (1) use open data from FAO to design virtual villages with the aim of showing local social and economic issues in developing countries and (2) raise awareness about different and difficult contexts and issues in the world (especially in developing countries). The solution targets young people, in particular video games players and communities of players. Alimenta is app that uses gamification, real world simulation and auto-learning. Through the app players learn and discover contexts and situations of villages in developing countries that are struggling with food production and supply, water supply and related economical and social issues. The game itself aims to educate and boost the imagination of solutions to real issues and can also promotes donations. Players from real villages are also enabled to support the project and FAO by updating real data/information.

The Social Hackademy project fosters digital skills and competencies of young people from the disadvantaged  background by implementing collaborative educational activities based on the Social Hackademy co-creation methodology. The methodology positions young people in the centre of the co-creation process aimed at developing digital solutions for societal challenges.

External speakers offered inspiration and reflection on the key concepts embedded in the project’s methodology. The keynote speeches by EU Youth Coordinator Biliana Sirakova and Michela Magas, Chair of the Industry Commons Foundation and innovation advisor to the European Commission and the G7 leaders opened the event with insightful and inspiring inputs that set the tone of the conference.

We learnt from the newly created European Coordinator of Youth Activities within the European Commission Biliana Sivakova about  EU’s plans and support for upskilling young people and including them in the shaping of the future of the EU, announcing the European Year of Youth 2022, and stressed that  ‘’When supporting young people in their personal and professional development we have to focus on the development of different sets of skills and competencies as done in the EU Code Week and your Social Hackathon. Both initiatives combine the development of digital skills and soft skills like creative thinking, teamwork, problem-solving, etc.’’

Michela Magas, Chair of the Industry Commons Foundation and innovation advisor to the European Commission and the G7 leaders explained and showcased how innovation impacts and changes our societies. We understood how effective digital skills can be to create and innovate. She mentioned:  ‘’The idea of co-creation has now entered high-level policy. All disciplines need to join forces in order for us to stimulate and facilitate societal transformation. One of the ways on how to do that is to transfer best practices developed in the grass-root community through innovation, hands-on sessions and learning to a high policy level. The agenda of the conference featured presentations of the methodology and tools developed in the project that supports its implementation. 

Project partners also shared results and findings from methodology piloting that took place in Croatia, France, Greece and Italy.

Very interesting examples of young digital experts who developed their digital innovative projects have been presented during the Social Hackademy Award ceremony and the first winner was announced at the event: Team Alimenta #Zerohunger 2 from Italy was the most convincing in terms of local community impact, social relevance and innovation, transferability and openness and adherence to the SDGs.

The event was rounded up with panel debate on the potential and critical elements of co-creation methodologies for solving various societal challenges and empowering young people with Arjana Blazic (DigiEduHack), Dr Ping Kong (Heritage & Education), Salvatore Nigro (JA Europe) and Thomas Matthew (European Youth Forum).

We had the chance to experience how a #HackAD workshop might work to unite and put together people from remote and achieve significant results,  delivering solutions to real world issues.

Altheo Valentini, ALL DIGITAL Chair, highlighted that ‘’In social hacking, the focus is not on the event and the contest but rather on educational progress. That is why we  [Social Hackademy consortium] positioned hackathon as a part of training and learning experience.’’

To conclude with the words of Ivan Mušanović, trainer and project manager from CTK Rijeka, who lead the upscaling of the methodology: “The Social Hackademy methodology stands out because it enables young people to create something concrete while learning skills that are beneficial for them. Together this gives them a sense of accomplishment.”

00:00:00 Opening
00:01:40 Welcome from Altheo Valentini, Chair of the Board of ALL DIGITAL 00:07:30 Welcome from Peter Palvolgyi, CEO of ALL DIGITAL KEYNOTES: 00:11:00 Address from Biliana Sirakova, EU Youth Coordinator, European Commission, Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture 00:27:36 Address from Michela Magas, Chair of Industry and member of President Von der Leyen’s New European Bauhaus High Level Round Table, Commons Foundation
01:00:26 Social Hackademy and me
01:02:05 Valentina Canonico, association ATLAS
01:06:30 Ivan Mušanović, trainer, CTC Rijeka
01:12:15 Roxane Cabit, trainee and hacker from France
01:19:23 Dina Arvanitaki, trainee and hacker from Greece
01:28:50 Co-creation: Empowering young people for the 21st century 01:30:20 Ivan Mušanović, Project Officer, CTC Rijeka
01:43:50 Altheo Valentini, CEO, EGINA
02:03:16 Tiana Zignani, Project Officer, Public Libraries 2030
02:06:30 Social Hackademy Awards #Zerohunger 2 (winners of Social Hackathon Umbria) The Coding Gang (winners of Social Hackathon Patras) IT Girls (winners of Social Hackathon Rijeka) Feminist Surge (winners of Social Hackathon Montpeiller)
02:47:50 PANEL DISCUSSION:From developing a solution to actual implementation Arjana Blazic, DigiEduHack Ping Kong, Founder, Heritage & Education Salvatore Nigro, CEO, Junior Achievement Europe Thomas Matthew, Board Member, European Youth Forum
03:46:30 Mini Hack session

The conference will take place in the framework of 14th ALL DIGITAL Summit (13-15 October 2021) that our project partner ALL DIGITAL is organising online. Three day event titled Digital Skills and Tools for a Better World will in turn focus on the three digital empowerment themes: citizens and competence centres; STE(A)M educators; and young people. Explore the Summit PROGRAMME to learn more about the sessions and speakers.

Day three of the Summit will be entirely dedicated to Social Hackademy project where we will present how to empower young people from disadvantaged backgrounds by fostering digitals skills development through collaborative educational activities and actively include them in solving of societal challenges.

Social Hackademy Methodology supports the implementation of innovative actions and projects that demonstrate how digital and social innovation can mutually benefit for the realization of a “Digital Europe” founded on social value and social investments.

The conference will present essential building blocks of the Social Hackademy Methodology and results of its’ piloting:
– Curriculums for digital skills training courses (Web Design, Visual and Graphic Design, Native Mobile App Development)
– Handbook for educators (trainers, e-facilitators, teachers)
– Evaluations results from more than 120 young people, 15 trainers and 20 civil society organisations that took part in in pilot activities organised in Croatia, France, Greece and Italy
– Best digital solutions developed by young people at Social Hackathons

The conference will also offer food for thought with two interesting keynotes by distinguished speakers from the field of youth policy and innovation and open space for discussion about potential of co-creation methodologies for young people development.

Finally, you will have an opportunity to participate in the mini hack session that will give participants a taste of Social Hackademy Methodology.

Programme of the conference

09:00 – 09:10 Opening of the Social Hackademy Conference
Altheo Valentini, Chair, ALL DIGITAL
Peter Palvolgyi, CEO, ALL DIGITAL

09:10 – 09:50 Keynotes
Biliana Sirakova, EU Youth Coordinator, European Commission, Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture
Michela Magas, Chair of Industry and member of President von der Leyen’s New European Bauhaus High Level Round Table, Commons Foundation

09:50 – 10:30 Social Hackademy and me
Presentations from young people, trainers and civil society organisations representatives that participated in Social Hackademy project’s activities.

10:30 – 10:40 Break

10:40 – 11:10 Co-creation: Empowering young people for the 21st century
Presentation of the Social Hackademy co-creation methodology including digital skills training courses, Handbook for Trainers, Social Hackathon concept and implementation, preliminary evaluation results of piloting Social Hackademy Methodology in Croatia, France, Greece and Italy

Speakers:
Ivan Mušanović, Project Officer, CTC Rijeka
Altheo Valentini, CEO, EGINA
Tiana Zignani, Project Officer, PL2030

11:10 – 12:00 Social Hackademy Award Ceremony
Social Hackademy partners established four Social Hackademy Labs in Croatia, France, Greece and Italy to pilot and test the Social Hackademy Methodology. The activities in the Labs consisted of training courses for young people and Social Hackathons where trainees developed digital solutions for various societal challenges. Four national hackathon winners emerged from the events that compete for the Social Hackademy Award. The session will feature presentations of four teams:

The Coding Gang (winners of Social Hackathon Patras)
Team members: Lazarinis Lefteris, Kostaras Fotis
Zerohunger 2 (winners of Social Hackathon Umbria)
Team members: Andrea Emili, Giacomo Torti, Scharon Torretti, Alberto Fecchi, Alessandro Masci
IT Girls (winners of Social Hackathon Rijeka)
Team members: Marija Siladjev, Lana Prar
Feminist Surge (winners of Social Hackathon Montpeiller)
Team members: Nicolas Prodhomme, Sarah Truffert, Roxane Cabit, Fatima Melkaoui, Julien Pablo and Violeta Rodríguez Porras

12:00 – 13:00 Lunch break

13:00 – 14:00 Panel discussion: From developing a solution to actual implementation
The panel will discuss the potential and critical elements of co-creation methodologies for solving various societal challenges and empowering young people.

Speakers:
Arjana Blazic, DigiEduHack
Ping Kong, Founder, Heritage & Education Consulting GmbH
Salvatore Nigro, CEO, Junior Achievement Europe
Thomas Matthew, Board Member, European Youth Forum
Moderator: Borut Cink, ALL DIGITAL

14:00 – 15:00 Mini Hack session
The session will simulate a part of the Social Hackathon process. Participants will engage in identification of societal challenges that can be addressed by using Social Hackademy Methodology.

15:00 – 15:20 Closing plenary
Altheo Valentini, Chair, ALL DIGITAL
Peter Palvolgyi, CEO, ALL DIGITAL

Speakers

Michela Magas is Chair of the Industry Commons Foundation. She bridges research and industry with a track record of over 25 years of innovation. Michela is innovation advisor to the European Commission and the G7 leaders, Member of President von der Leyen’s High Level Round Table for the New European Bauhaus, and member of the Advisory Board of CERN IdeaSquare (ISAB-G). In 2017 she was awarded European Woman Innovator of the Year and in 2016 she was presented with an Innovation Luminary Award for Creative Innovation by the European Commission and Intel Labs Europe. She is Innovation and Sustainability Manager for the first of the Industry Commons EU-funded projects OntoCommons – which is creating an ontology ecosystem with reference data documentation for cross-domain interoperability. She is also the Founder and CEO of Stockholm-based MTF Labs, a global community platform of around 8000 creative innovators and scientific researchers. 

In a live, 3-day experience that took place on September 6th, 7th and 8^th of September 2021 at the premises of the Hellenic Open University in Patras, 19 young people aged 16-30, co-created digital solutions to problems related to the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

This Hackathon selected the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN Agenda 2030 as the main framework for identifying the relevant societal challenges to be addressed locally with the active participation of Civil Society Organizations. The challenges were designed in collaboration with 4 CSOs as follows:

1. Visualization of data on surplus drugs in Greece – designed by Givmed (https://givmed.org/en/)

2. Emotional Intelligence, Transformational Leadership and Workplace Prosperity – designed by InetrmediaKT (https://intermediakt.org/home-gr/)

3. Detection of invasive – terrestrial organisms (plants, animals) in the ecosystem. The case of Ailanthus altissima – designed by the Ecological Movement of Patras (https://www.oikipa.gr/)

4. Recording the problem of pollution from garbage that is thrown away out of the bin – designed by Save Your Hood (https://saveyourhood.gr/)

The participants were organized in groups.  Each group was supported by a facilitator, and there was frequent contact with the social actors who designed the challenges. The applications developed by the young hackers concerned functional prototypes or mockups which provided pioneering solutions to the challenges posed.

At the end of the event, the participants received a symbolic gift and the 3 best solutions were awarded by a special committee.

It is noted that the organization of Hackathon complied with all the necessary safety rules regarding the COVID19 pandemic by making use of the digitally interconnected, modular rooms of HOU.

This platform is one of the initiatives launched under the Connecting Europe Facility Programme and will contribute to the Digital Europe Programme. This ambitious EU programme aims to make Europe more competitive in the global digital economy by increasing digital capacity and ensuring a wide use of digital technologies across the EU. The platform aims to boost the digital competencies of European society and the workforce by enforcing the digital skills pillar of the programme.

This platform is for everyone – from citizens, businesses to public organisations. It strives to make available a wide range of high-quality information, resources, and opportunities related to digital skills and jobs suitable for all digital skills levels. The platform also offers its members a collaborative community space where networking, interactions and member-led discussions on technology can take place.

The platform brings together stakeholders from across Europe and is a great opportunity for #hackAD as it offers:

– Insights into national strategies and digital trends
– Opportunities for personal and professional development
– Good practices
– National strategies
– Funding opportunities
– News, opinions, and events

As we have seen during the COVID19 pandemic, digital technologies are a central part of our daily lives and it is vital to have the digital skills needed to navigate these. Discover the Digital Skills and Jobs Platform and join this growing community!

The Digital Skills and Jobs Platform is financed by the European Commission’s Connecting Europe Facility. The Platform is developed by a consortium of organisations led by European Schoolnet including: Tremend, DIGITALEUROPE, LIKTA, European DIGITAL SME Alliance, Public Libraries 2030 and empirica as a subcontractor.

Author: Tiana Zignani (Public Libraries 2030)
Photo: European DIGITAL SME Alliance, screen capture

The SHU has been organised since 2016 and the biggest difference this year was that the hackathon (and training courses) are a part of the Erasmus+ project Social Hackademy (#HackAD), which aims to upscale and transfer Social Hackathon Umbria format and methodology in different European countries and contexts. To enable that #HackAD project partners prepared a formalized Social Hackademy methodology that enables anyone to implement this unique co-creation system for addressing social challenges and enhancing digital skills of young people.

Altheo Valentini, General Manager of EGInA Srl, main organizer of the event since 4 editions, together with his team opted to create a partnership which would bring a real impact. For that, they approached the local enterprise Fertitecnica Colfiorito and United Nation’s FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) which both welcomed the proposal enthusiastically.

After taking part in the training courses designed by #HackAD’s project partners, a group of young people from Umbria Region was selected to participate in the Social Hackathon. They became members of teams which were developing digital solutions for previously identified societal challenges. The development process was supported by the guidance of professional team managers, experts in the field of digital technology. All the results, from web platforms, apps to games were dedicated to the promotion and dissemination of good practices for sustainable development, in particular in the 4 selected areas: #zeroimpact, #zerowaste, #zerohungher, #zeroignorance. The event lasted 4 full days, while the hacking itself was done in 48 hours of Social Hackathon. All together, SHU2021 welcomed 300 people.

The hackathon jury was composed of the following experts in the fields involved: Erik Van Ingen, FAO Digital Innovation Consultant; Michele Santilocchi, Marketing Manager of Fertitecnica Colfiorito; Enrico Fontana, from the national secretariat of Legambiente Onlus; Valentino Bobbio, general secretary NeXt-New Economy for all; Emma Pietrafesa, researcher in the field of new technologies and member of the Stati Generali dell’Innovazione (General States of Innovation); Arjana Blazic, Member of the steering committee of DigiEduHack of the European Commission; Simona Grande, researcher at the management department of the University of Turin; Jan Rehak, National Director of the Entrepreneurship Program at Technológico of Monterrey.

 “This event is important for FAO because it allows us to leverage our knowledge and put it at the service of the food crisis we are currently dealing with. The passion and dedication of the hackers to find sustainable and innovative solutions to our actual challenges have impressed us a lot. ” said Erik Van Ingen, FAO Digital Innovation Consultant

The hackers’ teams ideas were evaluated based on 4 criteria: (1) local community impact, (2) social relevance and innovation, (3) transferability and openness and (4) adherence to the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN Agenda for 2030.

Out of the 8 projects presented to the jury, SHU2021 awarded Alimenta, an idea developed for the #zerohunger challenge. Targeting video games players, the project consists in a gamification app which uses data from FAO Hand in Hand initiative to build virtual scenarios based on reality to show the situation in developing countries, keep it updated with local involvement, in order to create awareness.

Zig4all project is the second winner and focuses on the #zeroignorance challenge. The idea is to build a social web platform available for all and dedicated to providing information about today’s world issues and challenges. The platform aims to translate the real community into a virtual one using blog, gamification and virtual reality (Mozilla Hubs)  in combination with storytelling

For the #zerowaste/#zeroimpact challenge, the award was delivered to the project Circular Colfiorito consisting in a web platform designed to showcase local stories and interviews by local people sharing their experience, knowledge and projects about sustainable development, and engaging in this process local organizations and NGOs. The project aims to create engagement among Colfiorito’s local people by using different multimedia, including gamification.

The teams which won the first 3 awards will be invited to a virtual meeting at FAO to pitch their ideas in fall.

The jury assigned 3 more special awards which as prize will give the designed project to have concrete follow up and development. The special award “NeXt-new economy for all” focuses on the contribution to the Aganda 2030’s objectives regarding social, environmental and economic sustainability, and was delivered by NeXt to the idea IMPATT0 Zero. NeXt will set up an incubation path for the project and will introduce it to the Civil Economy Prize in Firenze. The special DigiEduHack prize, was awarded to Zig4all giving the team the chance to participate to an international event on sustainable change and to further develop their idea. The 1^st award winning project Alimenta also won the #HackAD prize, thanks to which the team will participate to a European competition with all the winners from the other social hackathons organized in the other partner countries of the Erasmus+ project.

“Sustainability is fundamental for us.”, emphasized Luca Mattioni, Vice President of Fertitecnica Colfiorito. “For this reason, we are strongly focused on circular economy projects regarding not only the packaging of our products but also a strong digital communication strategy in order to educate consumers on good practices of reuse and reduction of food waste. “

Altheo Valentini opened the award ceremony, highlighting the importance of the return of this event in Umbria with a stronger structure and potential outcome. “Finally, after more than one year of pandemic, we are able to come back with an event that allows us to foster our community and take it forward” said Altheo. “We want to thank Colfiorito for having contributed to the conception of the initiative since the very beginning with the support of FAO in the context of the memorandum of understanding that exists between them”.

The collaboration between FAO and Fertitecnica Colfiorito goes back to 2016, “Our collaboration with FAO is based on three fundamental themes” explains Alessio Milani, General Manager of Fertitecnica Colfiorito. “he work with cooperatives in developing countries; the promotion of aspects related to agriculture and sustainable development in these countries and the help to small businesses to enter our market. It is important to be aware that everyone can do something, from the consumer to the company and to involve people in this project, especially youth.” he concluded. Both EGInA and Fertitecnica efforts were enthusiastically recognized by FAO: “It strikes me very much how well Fertitecnica Colfiorito has integrated the sustainability model communicated by the United Nations and how the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were successfully communicated during the Social Hackathon by Altheo with EGInA’s team” commented Erik van Ingen.

A round table on “Colfiorito 4 SDGs” with senior representatives of FAO and Fertitecnica Colfiorito was also organized on Saturday morning as one of the main activities to trigger an even more important impact of the work realized so far by the different stakeholders engaged, connect it and share it at the national and then global level.

In addition to the conference, several workshops were held on the themes of the 2030 Agenda including: Gender equality, and the role of women in work; Education on sustainable development with a focus on STEM engineering and technical science careers; Presentation of the Refugee Card at the CAS of Colfiorito. CRHACK Lab Foligno 4D, the cultural association affiliated to EGInA created also a mixed reality village for the enhancement of cultural heritage, where the event guests could enjoy VR and AR experiences with high quality tech equipment.  A Green Lab and a creative campus on SDGs was also organized for the little ones, to enhance their creativity and bring them closer to digital technology in the context of sustainability.

The Social Hackathon Umbria 2021’s goal was to promote collaboration and co-creation in the future for a systemic innovation of the agricultural and cultural sector of the region, spreading and strengthening digital and social inclusion, and empowering youth with tools for a stronger involvement in the research of sustainable solutions for a better food future for all.

Author: Linn Rasimelli, EGINA
Photo: EGINA