On Friday, March 31st, Forum for Civic Activism in cooperation with Office for Good Governance of the Prime Ministry, organized the National Philanthropy Conference. The aim of this conference is implementation of cooperation between the most important sectors of the society: the public, private and civic sector, with aim of inclusion of Kosovo society in its sustainable development.

Discussion at this conference led to a conclusion that businesses in Kosovo are uninformed about the profit that they can have through their philanthropic investments in different projects of civic society. However, the obstacle to do so doesn’t come directly from the law, but due to overwhelming administrative procedures.

Director of the Office for Good Governance Mr. Habit Hajredini said that this activity aims to address issues related to sustainable development of Philanthropy in Kosovo.

“Philanthropy is focused in long term efforts to address the origin of economic, social, health, and educational problems” - he said.

The Executive Director of FCI, Dajana Berisha said that overwhelming administrative procedures and the lack of information are the bottleneck of the development of philanthropy. She stated that even though legislation in Kosovo allows sponsoring up to 10% of the annual profit of corporations, these 10% are not used due to the overwhelming procedures and the lack of information in the corporate sector for the profit from strategic philanthropy investments in the projects of civic society.

Arian Zeka from AmCham said that private sector has a key role in supporting and promoting philanthropy in Kosovo.

Among the participants of the conference were representatives of European Union in Kosovo, members of the Council for Cooperation with Civic Society, and other participants with the aim of development of Philanthropy in Kosovo.