At the Club Evening in March, NBEC members and our guests had the opportunity to welcome two guests of honor and referents at once.

A small group of Club representatives, not wanting to miss out on the last winter entertainment, went to the Dudutki museum complex on 26.02.2017 to celebrate Maslenitsa. The Dudutki museum complex is probably the most famous ethnographic museum landscape in Belarus. Created and operated on a private initiative, the complex offers visitors not only permanent attractions and exhibits but also regularly holds themed events that are inspired by ancient customs and everyday life in the Middle Ages. These events include the summer festival of knights “Our Grunwald” and ” Maslenitsa”, a winter send-off party.

The last days of the year brought good weather: it snowed for the last time and there was ice on the roads – a suitable framework for saying farewell to winter. In addition, “Dudutki” itself seems to be quite a popular place for Minsk residents – the event attracted a lot of visitors to the complex.

We saw, during the 2.5-hour tour around the workshops and other attractions of the complex, that the complex is worth visiting anyway. During the tour, visitors learned a lot about the everyday life of our ancestors from the pre-industrial past and were able to experience their daily struggles. Not least because of the opportunity to see with their own eyes how things were produced in a blacksmith’s, pottery, or weaver’s workshop and to touch the making of everyday items. These objects and some of their own labor (a very topical issue in Belarus) could be taken away as souvenirs. The entertaining tour was enlivened by tastings of organic products – bread, butter, cheese, sauerkraut, lard, and moonshine – that added a special atmosphere to this somewhat different visit to the museum.

A short ride on a horse-drawn carriage showed us the advantages of modern means of transport, especially in winter.

It ended with a traditional round dance around a lit Maslenitsa straw figure.

The only fly in the ointment, as it often happens at public events in Belarus, was rather an inert service in the complex – visitors had to be patient enough to get something to eat and drink. But in the end, we overcame this difficulty, and the quality of the barbeque rewarded us for the previous wait.

Taking these pleasant winter experiences with us, we decided to return to Dudutki again in the summer, better for the Knights’ Festival, and best of all, in the company of numerous Club members.

On 01.02.2017, the regular general meeting of the members of the German-Belarusian Economic Club for 2016 was held.

The first event in the 2017 Club calendar was the Club Evening on 11.01.2017.

On 16 November this year, the German-Belarusian Economic Club and the German Economic Representation Office jointly held the 9th German Economy Day in Belarus. Thus, both organizers successfully continued the tradition of one of the landmark events of the German-Belarusian economic community, which was established back in 2007. Also traditionally the event was held under the patronage of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Minsk.

The venue of the 9th German Economy Day was the conference hall of the Johannes Rau International Education Center, a member of the German-Belarusian Economic Club. The 9th German Economy Day was devoted to the relevant and very controversial topic “Professional personnel in Belarus – condition, potential, cooperation”. After the opening of the event the organizers welcomed all the participants of the 9th German Economy Day by Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in Belarus Peter Dettmar and First Deputy Minister of Education in Belarus Vadim Bogush. The speeches of Peter Dettmar and Vadim Bogush set the appropriate tone for the event and served as an impetus for the transition to the substantial part of the 9th German Economy Day – panel discussions. Afterwards, Wolfgang Hombrecher, Senior Advisor at the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, presented the BMWI Manager Development Programme, which is exemplary of international cooperation in the field of manager development and will celebrate its 10th anniversary in Belarus on 23.11.2016. During this period, more than 400 managers have been able to take part in the programme and undergo retraining in Germany.

In panel discussions, experts from public authorities and private educational institutions in Belarus and Germany, along with representatives from the economic sector, among whom were also members of our Club, discussed not only the current competitive advantages of Belarusian professionals, such as good professional training in natural and technical disciplines, but also the current challenges caused by the shifting boundaries between technical and natural sciences and the expected increase in demand. Also discussed were already existing cooperation programmes, namely the highly successful DAAD programme in Belarus, the Goethe Institute in Belarus, and the European project “The Bridge”. The discussions were characterised by an unmistakable frankness and constructive straightforwardness and provided all present with interesting information and information for further more in-depth study of the issue.

The first indisputable success of the event was confirmed by the signing of a cooperation agreement between the Club member, Schneider Group and the Club’s partner, FEZ “Vitebsk”.

The official part was followed by a buffet at the Westfalia Restaurant which was a fitting conclusion to the event. During the relaxed communication, representatives from various sectors discussed not only the results of the panel discussions, but also had plenty of opportunities to establish new and develop existing contacts.

The event gathered more than 200 participants from various organisations. Among them were representatives of ministries of Belarus and Germany, public and private educational institutions, business sector – German and Belarusian companies, mostly HR officers.  A special joy for us, as for the organisers of the event, was the participation of the students of the Belarusian State University in the 9th Day of the German Economy. Some of them had an opportunity to take part in discussion of the topic which first of all concerns them directly as future specialists.

Such active participation testified to the great popularity and success of the 9th German Economy Day and confirmed our intention to continue the tradition of the German Economy Days in the coming years.