CECI in Senegal for IVCO 2022

From October 16 to 19, 2022, the international cooperation community gathered in Senegal to participate in the world's largest annual event on volunteerism. The Conference of International Volunteer Cooperation Organizations (IVCO) is a joint initiative of Carrefour International and the International Bureau for Children's Rights (IBCR).

The Executive Director of CECI's International Network, Mr. Philippe Dongier, as well as several representatives of CECI-Canada and CECI-Senegal participated in this meeting place for all stakeholders in international volunteering in order to facilitate reflection in this new era of international cooperation.

What is IVCO?

IVCO promotes knowledge sharing and encourages reflection by various stakeholders on the sustainability of volunteer cooperation. CECI representatives were able to exchange on ways to innovate in the field of volunteer cooperation and share best practices in the current global context. Such an event also allows us to discover the latest advances in this field.

The main themes of this event were
- Thinking the future of volunteering
- Inequalities in volunteer cooperation
- Technology and volunteering
- The role of migrants and refugees in international volunteering

Around these four themes, the Forum was divided into conferences, workshops, expert panels and networking opportunities between members and guests. The ultimate goal was to show that international cooperation can follow a multidimensional model and that its actions are as multiple as its actors. 

Innovation at the heart of the discussion

The quality of the discussions was one of the highlights for CECI Senegal's director, Mouhamadou Leye:

"[...] international volunteering in a post-COVID context must allow us to continue to evolve and innovate by building on lessons learned, particularly in relation to synergies between different types of volunteer mandates that promote more equitable exchanges between the South and the North in a sustainable development perspective by including more of the most vulnerable and marginalized communities."

The presence of our members was sucessful according to Philippe Dongier:

"The conference is the scene of very stimulating dialogues on a new era of volunteerism for development, with civil society organizations, governments, academic institutions as well as volunteers from all continents."

Among the topics of discussion that caught the attention of the representatives: ways to evolve approaches with more reciprocity, better integration of national and South-South volunteerism, the use of technology to enable more distance volunteering and citizen engagement in synergy with face-to-face volunteering.

CECI's participation in the IVCO is a success and our members come back ready to implement the solutions explored.