All posts by : İNGEV

The New Year celebration at INGEV was combined with the evaluation of 2022 and wishes for 2023. Employees expressed their new year wishes with a word of their choice.

Those who came to the microphone explained the word they chose, along with their reasons. Prosperity, peace, solidarity, and impact were the most striking words.

Prosperity was a wish for renewal against the economic difficulties that the country experienced in 2022 and which had an impact on each individual.

Peace is an expression of the desire for more harmonious social relations instead of the increased stresses in our daily lives.

The impact is a reflection on our ability to continue our work independently, without being limited by the duration or framework of any single project, and to increase our contribution to the quality of people’s lives, which we have been emphasizing a lot in recent months.

For all this, we need more solidarity.

Once again, we wish everyone a year of prosperity, peace, and solidarity in 2023, in which they can make an impact on social development.

One of the most important variables that will improve Türkiye’s human development level is women’s participation in the economy. According to the last global human development report, Türkiye went down by 14 places due to its weakness in this area.

UN Women’s “Strong Civic Space for Gender Equality” project implemented with financial support of the European Union, is an important initiative to support progress in this area.

As part of this project, INGEV took responsibility for bringing women who are “neither in education, employment, nor training” (NEET) into the economy; a cooperation agreement was signed with UN Women. A plaque of cooperation was presented to INGEV to commemorate the day.

At this stage, the program covers three important provinces: Mardin, Sanliurfa, and Gaziantep.

The program is called “hand in hand” (eleleyiz) to symbolize the harmonious development of employment, individual, and household income, women’s solidarity, and local business life. It will focus especially on the 18-29 age group.

It will be realized in cooperation with local governments, civil society organizations, business organizations, public representatives, universities, and other stakeholders in the region.

The project will contribute to employment in these three provinces through needs analysis, trainings, mentoring, and consultancy.

We are excited to be a part of the work for the improvement of women’s rights and gender equality.

This newsletter was created and maintained within the framework of the “Strong Civic Space for Gender Equality” project, implemented by UN Women with the financial support of the European Union. Its contents are the sole responsibility of INGEV and do not necessarily reflect the views of UN Women, United Nations, and the United Nations, any of its associated organizations, or the official position of the European Union.

The network event of our “SheWorks” project, which aims to develop the digital capacity of women who are neither in education, employment, nor training (NEET) and to provide equal opportunities in digital sectors, was called “She Did It!”; and yes, they do it!

Within the scope of the project, effective trainings were provided in areas such as digital marketing, web, graphic design, e-commerce, and online marketing. Seminars were given on CV preparation, interview techniques, and work culture.

Women with entrepreneurial ideas worked with consultants to turn these ideas into business plans.

The opening speech was made by Tara Scheurwater, Consul General of Canada in Istanbul, who supported the project, and the event continued with interactive seminars.

The meeting ended with a collaboration development session.

At INGEV, we work with the culture that projects may come to an end but our relationship and support to the beneficiaries should continue.  We maintain the same understanding for the “SheDidit” project.

In cooperation with UNDP Türkiye, UNDP Acceleration Lab, Education Reform Initiative, and Science Made Fun, we organized the “Workshop on Strengthening Science-Based Climate Action in Education”.

At the workshop, we came together with civil society organizations and scholars working in the fields of children, climate and education. We discussed the needs, current solutions, and future solutions by taking into account the triangle of education, science and climate.

The sessions we organized during the workshop showed the importance of understanding the climate crisis and producing solutions on the basis of applied science. Raising children’s awareness of the climate crisis is of decisive importance for the struggle.

Our work continues in line with #ACE (Action for Climate Empowerment), which was the main agenda item at COP27, and the dissemination of the applied science approach in education.

We strive to contribute to other non-governmental organizations in the areas we specialize in.  We sought to contribute to the individuals supported by the Positive Living Association, which draws attention with its work for vulnerable groups, with “CV Writing and Interview Techniques” trainings.

Following the trainings, we held focus group discussions on the barriers and opportunities that beneficiaries face in accessing livelihoods and gained a better understanding of their needs. We hope to work more effectively to address these needs in the coming period. Employment opportunities sufficient for a decent living are a human right for everyone.

Human development and sustainable development are INGEV’s core areas of work. After various preliminary analyses, we determined that the human development index we prepared for districts could be developed in a way that could also measure sustainable development for provinces.

After a year of intensive data collection, processing, and indexing, a large team, with Prof. Murat Şeker as the academic coordinator, prepared the HDI/SDG index report. Thus, for the first time in the world, performance measurement of sustainable development goals on the basis of local governments was realized.

The project was carried out entirely with INGEV’s own resources.  Vural Çakır wrote the introduction and Louisa Vinton, UNDP Resident Representative in Türkiye, wrote the foreword of the report, which analyzes the subject in detail.

The report covers all the items of sustainable development goals that fall within the scope of local governments. Our cities were evaluated in general as well as in the following sub-categories; Reducing inequalities, safe cities, decent work, and economic growth, quality education, health and quality of life, innovation and infrastructure, sustainable environment and energy, sustainable environment and communities, gender equality.

Istanbul ranked first in Human Development and Sustainable Development in Metropolitan Cities. Ekrem İmamoğlu, who attended the launch and award ceremony, emphasized the importance of independent studies and thanked INGEV.  Ankara, Antalya, Eskişehir, and İzmir were among the top five.  Yılmaz Büyükerşen, Muhittin Böcek, and Tunç Soyer attended the live broadcast and shared their views. On behalf of Ankara Metropolitan Municipality, the Secretary-General M. Kemal Çokakoğlu also attended the launch meeting and expressed his views.

In the provincial category, Çanakkale, Edirne, Isparta, Yalova, and Sivas municipalities took the first five places.

Click here to watch the event again (in Turkish)

Click here to read the executive summary of the HDI/ SDG Report

After nearly a year of intensive work, we announced the successful district municipalities at the launch of the “Human Development Index – Districts” (HDI-D).

As with all our work in this field, the report was prepared by a large INGEV team under the coordination of Prof. Murat Şeker.

Data sources included central statistics, local statistics, district strategic plans, activity reports, and secret citizen surveys. In total, 81 different variables were used.

In the report, districts are ranked according to human development overall and nine sub-categories.

The sub-categories are Governance and Transparency; Social Inclusion; Economic Status; Education; Social Life; Transportation and Accessibility; Health; Environmental Performance; and Gender Equality.

The results were announced at the launch meeting. Mayors who managed to rank high in human development shared their experiences on live broadcast and thanked for the work carried out completely independently and with INGEV’s own resources. The results were widely covered in print and broadcast media.

According to HDI-D results, the most successful municipality in human development was Kadıköy.  Çankaya, Beşiktaş, Şişli, and Bakırköy districts were in the top five.

Kadıköy also ranked first in the categories of governance and transparency, social inclusion, health, social life, and gender equality.

Çankaya ranked first in the education category, Beşiktaş in economic situation and transportation and accessibility, and Sarıyer in environmental performance.

In general, social inclusion and environmental performance were the weakest categories for district local governments.

Now in its sixth year, the HDI-D is one of the world’s leading initiatives in its field.

Click here to watch the event again (in Turkish)

Click here to read the HDI-D Report. (Only in Turkish)