That was the Mini-Van Tour 2023!

The biggest Mini-Van Tour to date has successfully concluded!

The tour included visits to six cities in five different countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, Croatia and Austria) with the aim of cross-community work and social inclusion through interactive sports activities and capacity building.

The Mini-Van Tour visited six cities this year – Gornji Vakuf-Uskoplje (BiH), Ljubinje (BiH), Tivat (MNE), Brodarevo (SRB), Parag (CRO), and Graz (AT). In collaboration with local partners and trained Football Zajedno workshop facilitators, our team successfully implemented planned activities and directly engaged thousands of children and youth, coaches, teachers, parents, and other citizens of these cities.

Each location visited by the Mini-Van Tour represents a unique story addressing the idea of working in divided communities and bringing people together. Through all the stops and interactions with the local population, we gained valuable insights into their communities and the challenges they face, which we will strive to address in our future activities.

David Hudelist as project manager of Sport Together and Football Zajedno “would like to thank everyone who was part of this beautiful story, and we look forward to continuing our collaboration and engaging in further activities. In this tour I personally could learn a lot of this unique region and people, and I also brought with me plenty of ideas for the future”.

The Mini-Van Tour team traveled for 14 days in a van equipped with our Streetkick (an inflatable football pitch), microsoccer (1-on-1 football field), fairplay workshop-stations, as well as a variety of other fun and educational activities through which they could discuss topics relevant to their local communities.

Apart from football, the Mini-Van Tour also included many other sports such as basketball, volleyball, and judo. Besides sports activities, children could enjoy music stations with dancing, drawing together and fun educational games and of course lot of conversations and discussions. fairplay workshops were an integral part of the program, providing children with the opportunity to learn about the importance of fairplay and respect.

“We are very proud of this joyful and educational tour. Our team returned home tired but with smiles on their faces because the greatest treasure of all was seeing so many different children – boys, girls, and children with developmental disabilities – having fun, playing, and having the opportunity to share their opinions and overcome socially imposed barriers and prejudices”, says Mirna Hrapovic as coordinator of the tour.

The Mini-Van Tour is part of the Football Zajedno project and the European project Sport Together, both focusing on promoting equality, human rights, and combating nationalism and segregation. The tour was organized by the local organisations "Igrajmo Zajedno" Initiative (iZi) and Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR) from Sarajevo and the fairplay initiative from Vienna and in close collaboration with local partners, sports clubs, and non-governmental organizations.

This activity was co-financed through the Erasmus+ Program of the European Union, as well as by the Football Associations of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro under the UEFA HatTrick V program, and the Austrian Development Agency.