Across The Waters’ Exchange programme

Exchanging experiences in conservation

A large knowledge base of experience and exemplary practices has accumulated, over the last few decades, within conservation and environmental organizations.

However, this wealth of experience has not been tapped to its full potential. For instance, activities that were originally conceived and designed as pilot experiences are not properly advertised or repeated, due to lack of funds or human resources, or because of poor planning or ineffective communication strategies.

The lack of access to worthwhile experiences and model practices is a serious drawback to the quantity and quality of conservation work. It hinders the development of quality actions and programmes where mistakes are not repeated or large amounts of human and financial resources wasted on processes that have already been tested elsewhere.

WWF Mediterranean has set up an exchange mechanism to increase stakeholder capacity to access information.

Exchange objectives

• To facilitate the circulation of people, ideas, experiences and best practices among all stakeholders in the region.
• To promote a better understanding of conservation and environment in the Mediterranean.

The exchange programme is a flexible one. Organizations can participate as hosts or send guest participants or both. While hosts make their expertise available to others, participants learn from the host’s experience.

Independent of the nature of the exchange, each initiative is perceived as a two-way process which will benefit both participant and host.

Types of exchanges

• Visits, where participants follow a programme of meetings and activities to understand the functioning of the host organization or a specific activity. Visits usually last from 5 to 14 days.
• Internships, lasting from 3 weeks to 3 months, where participants learn about the host organization, participate in its daily activities, and contribute skills.

The duration of the exchange depends on the objectives and availability of time of both host and participant.