Thursday 10 October 2013

Time, Space, Action and Communication...and Energy!

This morning we carried on with our group presentations. This involved analysing our job shadowing experiences using a framework proposed by Péter Wootsch, a Hungarian youth expert and trainer working within the ODYU project.


We saw presentations from Bolivia, Hungary, Spain, Paraguay, Uruguay and the UK. These consisted of analysing our own personal experiences using the concepts of Time: how did you use your time? How did the host use the time? What was your perception of time during your job shadowing experience?; Space: Where did you stay? Where did you work? What did you notice about the culture/environment/ places you visited?; Action: What laws/procedures were followed during your job shadowing experience? What activities did you do? How did these match up to your expectations?; and Communication: How did you communicate with the people you met? Did you use signs, symbols, gestures for example. Was the language barrier a problem? How did you overcome this? 





Through using this framework we could make clear comparisons between different countries and the job shadowing experiences that were provided.

Importantly, we got the views of both the host country and the opinion of those who went to job shadow in each country. It became clear that there were differing perspectives of the concepts and how they would be/were used during the job shadowing process. This feedback will be summarised and taken on board in the planning of future projects which we will discuss further in the next coming days. 





This afternoon we went to visit Montes del Plata, a power plant used to extract pulp from the trunk of a eucalyptus tree as well as converting the excess bio mass into energy. Unfortunately we were unable to tour the plant itself as it was undergoing construction. It is aiming to be the global leader in pulp production and for that it needed some work. It aims to produce 1300,000 tonnes of pulp per year. To produce one tonne requires 3.5 cubic meter of woodland so I'm sure you can appreciate the the amount of work they hand on their hands clearing space for such a large amount of trees!

The plant is also used for researching and testing tree production, assessing what environments are most effective for pulp production. 

After extracting the pulp the rest of the tree (the bio-mass) is used to create energy. The plant aims to produce 164mw of energy per year. The plant itself uses 90mw so they have 74mw left over for the national grid. This fuels roughly 200,000 houses per year. 



The plant and its import/export terminals caused quite a lot of disruption to the village it was built in. As a result the village and its people had to relocate. As a way to minimise damage to the neighbourhood the plant runs projects with the local people bringing the benefits of the plant directly to these people and their homes. For example, the plant has brought with it improved transport routes in terms of ease of access to the area itself. The plant also runs training courses for local people, training them up with the skills required to work at the plant. Thus the plant has actually created more jobs and better job prospects for the people of the village. Approximately 68% of the people working at the plant are from this village. Also the plant runs a domestic help plan with the people of the village in order to ensure the energy produced by the plant is used effectively in their own homes. 

The group is working hard and making good international connections. Hopefully this will continue over the next few days and create strong, meaningful future projects.


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