ABOVE:
Officials from the City of Karlovac visit Kansas City and attend the official opening of the
Legends Theatres u Village Westu, KCK
This is part of USAID's City Twinning project. Kansas City, Kansas and the City of Karlovac are cooperating to improve public services and asset management, and support enterprise development.
USAID Honors Croatian Professionals
USAID hosted an award ceremony honoring 171 Croatian citizens who attended USAID-sponsored professional development programs in the United States and around the world during last year.
Participants represented a broad spectrum of Croatian society including ministry officials, mayors and other members of local government, NGO representatives, judges, members of Parliament, political party officials, and business representatives. The training programs took place in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Germany, Malta, Estonia, Finland, Slovakia, and the Netherlands.
Thank you. It's a great pleasure for me to be here today.
I read an interesting quote the other day from an English novelist which, noted that "if you do not think about the future, you cannot have one. "
As Croatia 's most respected political leaders, government administrators, judges, entrepreneurs, agri-business leaders and community organizers I know each one of you is thinking hard about the futures of your organizations, your communities, and your country. As the EU's most recent candidate country whole new worlds of opportunity and challenges are at your doorstep. Croatia 's future is bright but not yet secure. Much will depend upon you.
We see our job at the United States Agency for International Development as helping each of you acquire the skills, the experience and the networks that will help you shape the best future for Croatia . The training programs you have recently completed were designed for that very purpose.
Often people ask me to explain why USAID is so interested in Croatia 's future. Let me be perfectly clear, we hope to see Croatia become an even stronger democracy whose prosperity will be assured by a productive and competitive market economy.
To reach this goal we are bringing together resources devoted to Empowerment, Employment, and Economic development. We call this linkage the "power of e-threes." (Of course this reference only works in English - "Empowerment, Employment, Economic Development"). By focusing on each of these "E's", we hope to produce the kind of individual advancement that equals progress for the nation as a whole.
Each one of you is a force multiplier for one or several of the "E's". Our political leaders and community organizers in the audience can speak about Empowerment. They learned how other countries build institutions and processes that invite active citizen participation and corporate social responsibility. Our businessmen and businesswomen here can talk a great deal about Employment . They saw how new investment can lead to new products and new employment opportunities. Those of you here responsible for government policy and management, including many from the Ministry of Agriculture, had the opportunity to look at how other countries manage Economic Development through monetary and fiscal policy, environmental oversight, disease control and astute navigation of the EU accession process. Finally, the judges here today have learned what is needed to apply state-of-the-art court management systems to their commercial courts.
Today we are recognizing 171 of you--not only for completing USAID training programs - but also for your outstanding contributions to your country, your institutions, your constituencies, and your employees. Between November last year and September of this year we custom tailored 25 training programs for you.
As you look around this room you will see people from every region of the country - from the biggest cities and the smallest towns. Let's remember this: empowerment, employment, and economic development are worthy goals for all Croatians not just some.
We still have much to do together. You continue to work toward the implementation of the Action Plans you developed during your training programs. Towards that end, through World Learning we recently awarded twelve Small Grants of $5,000 to help you achieve your goals. We were very impressed with the high quality of all the grant applications, and the dedication to your work that they represented.
Participant training programs complement our technical assistance activities. Many of your training programs were developed with support and input from our partner organizations. I would like to acknowledge the Academy for Educational Development, Development Alternatives Inc., Nathan Group and Urban Institute for their role in conceptualizing and defining the goals of your training programs.
In closing I want to stress that the challenge for you is to continue to use what you have learned through your training to bring about change - not to become complacent about your ability to bring about reforms in the organizations and institutions you represent. You are living in a country that Croatian citizens only dreamed about for generations. It is your turn to dream and to build the bright futures you want for your children and grandchildren.
Thank you very much for coming today.
