The Regional Directorate for Youth announced today that the applications for the Incentive Programme for Youth Associations (PIAJ) will be open until the last day of November.

Being one of the seven programmes comprised by the system of incentives for youth associations, PIAJ aims to support the development of activities promoted by youth associations and respective federations as well as by entities and bodies holding the status of youth associations.

This initiative encompasses two types of support: annual financial support and occasional financial support. The programme is open to youth associations, federations of youth associations headquartered and national organisations represented in the Autonomous Region of the Azores.

In addition, non-profit organisations of recognised merit and social importance promoting activities addressed at youngsters may also apply for the occasional financial support measure.

Applications for the Incentive Program for Youth Associations can be made via email: http://www.associativismo.drj.azores.gov.pt/
The System of Incentives for Youth Associations (SIAJ) is a scheme developed by the Government of the Azores, through the Regional Directorate for Youth, with the aim of providing new responses to youth associations.

In addition to contributing to the autonomy of associations, SIAJ also ensures the transparency and impartiality in the allocation of incentives and reinforces the training of association leaders, youth animators and youngsters, without neglecting the importance of infrastructures that are crucial to the successful development of their activities.

The awareness that youth associations have a privileged role in the exercise of citizenship and that they are spaces where one acquires the sense of belonging to a democratic community bearing values and ideals has guided the inception and definition of policies and strategies in the area of Youth. In this regard, the fostering of youth associations has been awarded priority status by the Government of the Azores.

Under the implementation of the goals set in the Programme of the Regional Government, which defends a comprehensive and integrated policy that acknowledges the important role of Youth in the construction of the present and future, youth associations have always been taken into careful consideration in the provision of responses, integrated in the Incentive System for Youth Associations.