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yesilay.org.tr
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YEŞiLAY
Reaching the60-member
mark for the International Federationof
GreenCrescentsby theendof 2017.
INTERVIEW
to those who took the initiative to set up their own Green Cres-
cents, sharingwith themall materials in our possession, including
the bylaws, institutional structure and publications of the Turkish
GreenCrescentSociety.
What are thesecountries supposed todo in their countries?
After theestablishmentof thenational GreenCrescents, thesec-
ond stepwas that theTurkishGreenCrescent Society introduced
agrant programfor thesenewlyestablishednational GreenCres-
cents in their infancy. "Establish your Green Crescent, draft your
project andwewill provide grant for it,"we told them. By doing so,
we sought to ensure that national Green Crescents should come
together and come up with a roadmap --example of which we
already provided-- and develop a project. And we, as the Turkish
Green Crescent Society, would support such projects. In 2016, 14
countries were awarded with the grant. This support proved to
be quite valuable in putting the efforts to establish national Green
Crescents on track in those countries despite the fact that those
national instances still lacked institutionalization.
You said we lend support to their drawing up their roadmaps. Can
we say that the Turkish Green Crescent Society is acting as a su-
pervisor for other countries?
We established the federation as an umbrella organization for
national Green Crescents. We, as the federation, organized a ca-
pacity building program in Istanbul. We brought together national
GreenCrescentswhichhadbeenestablishedsofarorwhichwere
in the process of being established at the Headquarters of the
Turkish Green Crescent Society in Istanbul. The experts briefed
national Green Crescents about capacity building strategies, the
struggle against addictions, the project preparation techniques,
corporate communication, public communication, etc. This was a
huge contribution for them. In 2017, we will organize another ca-
pacitybuildingprogram.
What canyousayabout thepurposeof establishmentof the Inter-
national FederationofGreenCrescents?
Our roadmap in establishing the federation was as follows: First,
wewouldestablisha certainnumber of national GreenCrescents.
In the next step, we aimed to create an umbrella organization to
bringthemtogether likethe internationalfederationsofRedCres-
cents or Red Crosses. Of course, Turkey was the only country to
establishsuchanorganization. After 34national GreenCrescents
were founded in approximately two years thanks to our support,
we brought them together in 2016 in Istanbul to declare the es-
tablishmentofthefederationofficially.Itsestablishmentwasreg-
isteredwitha resolutionof theCouncil ofMinisters inour country.
Other countries becamemembers of this federation. Like theAl-
banianorMalaysian GreenCrescents, theTurkishGreenCrescent
Society became a member of the federation... We held the first
General Assembly meeting of the federation immediately after
itsestablishment.Wesetupaseven-memberBoardofDirectors.
The Turkish Green Crescent Society assumed the chairmanship
of the Board of Directors.The Boardmemberswere elected from
other countries based on their geographical locations. Thus, the
federationbecameoperational. Our goal is to reach the60-mem-
bermarkby theendof 2017.