A group of community leaders from Peru, Somalia and Eritrea came to Frome last week to hear more about the community projects that Frome Town Council, Edventure, and others are involved with.
The group who come from refugee communities themselves and are based in the UK currently, are funded by Eurasmus to support their communities and young people. The emphasis was to share ideas, knowledge and skills to improve wellbeing.
Lajeel from Somalia, for example, is focussing on empowering women and has a group of young people whom she mentors via What’s App. The group visited Edventure, SHARE and the Community Fridge and are interested in setting up tool sharing and community fridges themselves.
Neil Oliver, chair of the board at Edventure offered the group advice on setting up their own Share Shop. He said, “The challenge is whether the concept will transfer to very different communities and cultures. The general consensus was that Share and the community fridge would add greatly to communities that have experienced a great deal of conflict,”
Fessahaye Gebregiorgis, a project manager from Eritrea, emphasized the importance of making a clear process of creating any community project saying, “It won’t be easy to start Share or Community Fridge in Eritrea due to the difficult political situation. Even continuous supply of electricity is not available. However, it is something we can explore in our host communities where we think these ideas could have a positive effect on the mental well-being of our youth.”
Frome Mayor, cllr Richard Ackroyd said, “It’s so inspiring to hear the way people are working with their communities to enable positive change in often very difficult circumstances. It’s humbling they have come to Frome to see what we do, and we look forward to hearing how they get on.”
If you would like further information on these or any other community projects that Frome Town Council are doing in Frome please go to www.frometowncouncil. gov.uk
