References

Institution Foundation BiT Planota was founded in 2006 with the purpose of encouraging the development of the countryside on the Banjšice and Trnovo Plateau. Its status of operation is in the public interest in the non-governmental sector and civil society. It strives to develop the programmes and projects which integrate various stakeholders: local communities, NGOs, individuals and public institutes.

The foundation has quite a lot of experience in preparation, execution and management of regional, national and international projects in various areas, such as development of human resources, social integration of people, youth, and development of NGO.

We encourage establishing local partnerships in the social economy between the public and non-governmental sector. The purpose is to connect organizations of the supporting environment in the region so that they can encourage the development of social economy, or the employment of disadvantaged groups, among them the youth. With the collaboration with other regional stakeholders (development agencies, municipalities, NGO, universities etc.) we strive to integrate the youth into the local development, and we encourage them to gain experiences already during their education. With the purpose of improving the conditions for the further development of the NGOs in the region we offer them supervision for the development of the organization and their services, help them prepare joint projects, we act as mediators at the negotiations between the NGO and the municipality, and we organise activities for the development of inter-sectoral collaboration for solving the local issues.

During the years the foundation has established a large network with other stakeholders from the region (municipalities, Employment Service of Slovenia, development agencies, centres of social work, NGOs, social businesses etc.) and from the whole Slovenia (Community of Regional NGO Centres, Centre for the Development of NGO, Association for Social Economy and Ministry of Public Administration). Through international projects we have established good relationships with various organizations (educational and development organizations, cooperatives etc.) and with other European countries (Italy, Spain, Hungary, Croatia etc.). Good connections with the financial institutes enable the founding of projects (bridging founding). The headquarters of the Foundation are at the Herbal Centre Grgarske Ravne, where we have our offices, and the space and equipment for the workshops and for the meetings.