The Caucasus mountain communities network was organised under the REC Caucasus and Russian REC project “Sustainable Development of Mountain Regions of the Caucasus – Local Agenda 21” funded by ministries of environment of Germany and the Principality of Liechtenstein implemented since 2003.

 

The project covers eight pilot communities of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia and the Russian Federation, for which, with assistance from RECs and donors, strategic development documents – Local Agenda 21s – were elaborated.

 

At the early stages of the Project the population of the pilot villages had no opportunity to cooperate with each other, since it had been considered as inexpedient. Residents of the Caucasus villages first met in 2004 in Turin (Italy) at the Slow Food event Terra Madre, the world meeting of food communities. It is hard to say if the meeting ever fostered any cooperation, as the villagers showed no direct response to meeting each other.

 

The second informal meeting of pilot village representatives took place in 2005 in Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) at a conference called “The Role of Local Self-government in the Sustainable Development of Mountain Regions in Central Asia”. The effect was rather unexpected even for the Project leaders: the main initiators of cooperation between the pilot villages were representatives of local self-governments of village Stur-Digora (North Ossetia) and village Chiora (Georgia). The aforementioned perspective for cooperation between transboundary villages became a reality. Local village leaders enthusiastically discussed opportunities of cooperation not only at the sessions of the conference but also at bilateral meetings. They kept on talking about possible transboundary environmental projects even in the Airport of Bishkek, and decided to hold a meeting of the two village leaders in the Caucasus to discuss next steps towards cooperation.