Since 2014, the Austrian Intercultural Achievement Award (IAA) has been awarded annually to innovative projects that successfully open up new avenues for intercultural dialogue. The aim is to highlight and encourage small or large-scale actions implemented throughout the world by associations or individuals to encourage dialogue between cultures and religions.

Among the 300 projects submitted in 2020 through the network of Austrian embassies, the association JRS France is the winner of the Intercultural Achievement Award 2020 in the category of Sustainable Project.

The JRS Youth programme - "The challenge of reciprocity: Share your talents, dare to meet! "caught the attention of the jury. This programme allows young (or not so young) asylum seekers, refugees or locals to meet and get to know each other around common and creative activities that they co-facilitate on an equal footing. The members are in turn participants or facilitators, and thus actors in a programme that they build together. Expression (theatre, dance, singing, drawing, writing), sports (football, volleyball, basketball, yoga, dance), discussion cafés, inter-religious meetings, outings to be experienced together (hikes, dinners at local homes, visits to museums, urban walks, board games) are all activities that promote and cement mutual understanding.

A variety of activities in an intercultural environment

In 2020, the JRS Jeunes programme organised 468 activities in 9 cities in France, involving 1338 participants of 60 different nationalities, including 740 refugees and asylum seekers. The grant given by the Republic of Austria to JRS France will be used to finance and carry out future collective and interdisciplinary actions in the framework of this intercultural project.

The Austrian Ambassador Michael Linhart presented Fr Antoine Paumard, Director of JRS France, and Ms Pauline Blain, JRS Youth Officer, with the IAA 2020 Award at a small ceremony on 10 February 2021.

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