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Bulgaria

Intro:

Dear GE friend,

My name is Maya Angelova and I am the GE ambassador for Bulgaria. I am part of NGO IDEA in Varna and with my colleagues we plan to build creative and innovative image of Bulgaria abroad and to implement some interesting practices in our country. I believe that GE can be the bridge for successful and trustworthy youth cooperation and the tool for achieving interesting youth events in Bulgaria.

As an ambassador of course, I have my aims and my motivation for working with GE. Youth policy in Bulgaria is not very well developed- for example we re still fighting for youth law, but yet in October 2009 we still don’t have one. One of my aims as an ambassador is through cooperation between IDEA NGO and local municipality of Varna to organize debates on hot topics- for example the first one we re preparing is the “Youth vs. Crisis” debate in November 2009. On events as this one we want to focus the media attention, the decision-makers attention on the mentality of youth and on our problems.

As well we are planning events for the beginning of December – series of workshops on eco-education, which is missing on the Bulgarian educational system. As well we want to focus youths’ attention on European values like volunteering, equal rights, anti- discrimination and youth mobility through workshops and training , made by our young and motivated team.

I encourage all young Bulgarians who are reading this to take part in our platform and to be active generation Europe.

Generation Europe local debates:

The debate held by Maya in November ’09 was about Youth and the Financial Crisis in Bulgaria. Read debate.

Selected links:

Useful links for foreigners in Bulgaria

http://varna.info.bg/ – website of Varna- summer capital of Bulgaria
http://www.bulgariatravel.org/eng/index.php – website for travelers
http://www.lot-lorien.com/ – one of the most interesting Bulgarian bands
http://www.bgmaps.com/ – maps of Bulgaria and detailed maps of some cities

http://www.youthbg.info/en/news/ – National Agency for “Youth in Action”, youth news and initiatives

http://www.vagabond-bg.com/ – Bulgarian magazine in English
http://www.novinite.com/ – news for and from Bulgaria and the world in English
http://www.visittobulgaria.com/visit/dir.asp?d=0-11-Embassies – foreign embassies in Bulgaria

Government links:

Media

Bulgaria in brief:

Area 110,910 sq km
Capital Sofia
Language Bulgarian, secondary languages closely correspond to ethnic breakdown
Population 7,450,349 (July 2005 est.)
Population growth rate -0.89% (2005 est.)
Life expectancy 68.41 years (men), 75.87 (women)
Literacy rate 98.6%
Religion Bulgarian Orthodox 82.6%, Muslim 12.2%, Roman Catholic 1.7%, Jewish 0.1%, Protestant, Gregorian-Armenian, and other 3.4% (1998)
Net migration rate -4.3 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2005 est.)
Ethnic groups Bulgarian 83.9%, Turk 9.4%, Roma 4.7%, other 2% (including Macedonian, Armenian, Tatar, Circassian) (2001)
Independence 3 March 1878 (as an autonomous principality within the Ottoman Empire); 22 September 1908 (complete independence from the Ottoman Empire)
GDP real growth rate 5.3% (2004 est.)