On May 12, the celebration of the Europe Day will be arranged like an EU garden Festival in the Vermanis Garden. The theme is the ‘European Year of Active Ageing and Solidarity Between Generations’ and the motto of the festival is ‘Let us be active through generations! Join in!’During the day, there will be different kinds of activities involving bicycling to promote ‘green traffic’ and to further ‘active ageing’ in Latvia. The programme is as follows:
•Bicycle Parade: 1.00-2.00 PM, with the participation of the EU-Ambassadors around the streets of Riga. Read more >

Baltic Environmental Forum-Latvia invites to participate in the international workshop on cooperation for better water resources management. Workshop is organized in the frame of the project “Strengthening NGO cooperation for better water management” and its aim is to share the experience and discuss the best solutions for the management of the water resources. Workshop will be held on May 10-11, 2012, in the Bauska parish, quest house “Bērzklani” (www.berzkalni.lv). On first day of the workshop there are presentations and discussions planned about the stakeholders’ involvement in the management of the water resources, about the available technological solutions for the waste water treatment in the rural areas, as well as about the experience in organizing the environmental campaigns in order to pay attention to the water quality. On second day of the workshop it is planned to attend the biological waste water treatment stations in the Rundāle parish

From April 20, Páll Stefánsson´s images of Icelandic scenery will be exhibited at the Nordic Council of Ministers´ Office in Latvia, 13/3 Marijas Str, Bergs Bazaar, Riga.
Páll Stefánsson about the exhibition: „What makes a nation? It must be the wind. As a photographer, I have never quite managed to capture the wind during the quarter century I’ve been photographing my country, Iceland. This, despite the fact that I’ve scrutinized every shape and color, the light, and anything else I am able to see.

On 20-21 April the International Summer School of Photography (ISSP) in cooperation with the Nordic Council of Ministers’ Office in Latvia will organise a master class LANDSCAPE AND MANSCAPE: THE EDGE OF RIGA led by the Icelandic photographer Páll Stefánsson. Participants will be working together with Páll Stefánsson, editor and picture editor of the Iceland Review magazine, who is famous for his large-format pictures of Icelandic landscape.

The master class is open for photographers, photography and art students as well as advanced amateurs interested in landscape photography and documentary photography in general. The working language is English; max number of participants - 15. Participation fee is 30 LVL. The fee covers organising expenses and bus tours (lunch not included). Applicants must submit a motivation letter with a short description of their photography work (up to 1500 characters) to office@issp.lv, adding their portfolio (as an attachment or as a homepage link) with 10-15 landscape/documentary photos. Applications can be written in Latvian or English but sufficient knowledge of English is required for the master class. Qualified applications corresponding to the selection criteria  will be accepted on the first come - first served basis.  Application deadline is 10 April 2012, 24:00.

Contact info: office@issp.lv, ph + 371 27842875 , + 371 29711721.

PHOTOGRAPHER PÁLL STEFÁNSSON was born in North Iceland in 1958. After photography studies in Sweden he joined the Iceland Review magazine in 1982 as a photographer, later also as a photo editor and editor-in-chief. Páll Stefánsson has published more than 20 books and has done advertising and commercial work for such organisations as Leica, Hasselblad,  Panasonic, IKEA, Volkswagen and UNESCO. The latter chose him as one of the 20 photographers to document the world heritage places. Páll Stefánsson has had exhibitions in all the world’s continents except for the Antarctic. His large format Icelandic panorama exhibition at the Museum of Natural History in New York was attended by a nearly million people. Páll Stefánsson’s works have been published in a number of  international  printed media, including Time, National Geographic, Newsweek, Geo, W, Sunday Times Magazine and German Vogue.   

As of 20 April, Páll Stefánsson´s images of Icelandic scenery will be exhibited at the Nordic Council of Ministers´ Office in Latvia, 13/3 Marijas Str, Bergs Bazaar, Riga (exhibition opening on 19 April, 18:00).

Páll Stefánsson  will hold a public lecture on 20 April, 18:00, at the film theatre K.Suns. Entrance to the lecture is free.

On 13 April Riga will host the 1st Nordic and Baltic Fashion and Textile Forum “Sustainability and New Markets” held by the Latvian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Nordic Council of Ministers Office in Latvia, the Danish Cultural Institute in Latvia, the Latvian British Chamber of Commerce in the UK and the International Exhibition Company BT 1. The forum aims to focus on strengthening the development of the fashion, design and textile industry in the Baltic Sea Region and to create a single platform to promote cooperation between fashion businesses and sustainable development of the fashion industry. The forum is also aimed to encourage a dialogue between the Nordic, Baltic, Russian, Chinese, Indian and UK industry representatives, thereby enhancing industry competitiveness and promoting new markets. This year the forum focus is on sustainability and new markets.

Downloading document forms, filling them in painstakingly, writing and sending e-mails, repeating all this over and over again if something goes wrong at some point... This is all in the past now. Latvian NGOs can now electronically apply for grants to engage in cooperation with the Nordic countries. This is effective and user and environmentally friendly. The new electronic application environment, which is called NCM-Grants (Nordic Council of Ministers' Grants), allows applications to be completed even a little at a time, right up to the deadline. The submission deadline this year is 2 April.

All civil servants and other staff in the public sector in the Nordic and Baltic countries that plan study visits, internships and networking in the Nordic-Baltic region can ease their budgets by applying for funding from the Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme for Public Administration. But don’t waste any time – the deadline is already March 30th! The joint Nordic-Baltic grant programme for public administration has been up and running since 2009. It has been well received as the number of applications has risen year by year. In 2011 the new electronic application system NB8-Grants was introduced and made the applying even easier, quicker and more comfortable; according to the feedback from applicants.

Would you like to do a study visit, to have an internship or to organize networking activities in the Baltic and Nordic countries? If you work in business and industry you can now apply for a grant for 2012. The joint Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme for Business and Industry promote economic cooperation, innovation and entrepreneurship to strengthen the global competitive power of the Nordic-Baltic region. The Programme gives financial support to SMEs, business incubators and organizations in the fields of business and industry to carry out study visits, internships, training or network activities. Activities supported by the programme require participation of minimum three countries, of these minimum one Nordic and one Baltic. The programme covers up to 70% of the costs related to travel, accommodation and network activities. Programme is now open for applications with the deadline 30 March 2012.

Do you run a residency for professional artists and culture practitioners, support their innovative artistic work, and have an ambition to create contacts in the Nordic-Baltic Region? If so, then you may send in an application now and latest 1 February 2012. The support that your residency may receive is meant for covering all the expenses directly connected to the artists that you choose to the residency. You may choose 2-4 artists or minor groups for approx. 2 moths' stay. The chosen artists have to live in another Nordic or Baltic country than the one that your residency is based in.

The Nordic Council of Ministers has extended the Nordplus programme for the period of 2012-2016. Some of the aims for the new programme is to strengthen and develop Nordic cooperation in education, and also between the Nordic and Baltic countries. The programme will contribute to develop quality and innovation in the educational systems for Life Long Learning (LLP) in the participating countries. The programme will also promote Nordic languages. One change is that the sub programme Nordplus Nordic Language and Culture will be included in Nordplus like the other programmes. This means that Baltic countries can apply for funding through the language programme. The call for proposals is now available, and the application deadline is the 1st of March 2012.