Drug Abuse Prevention Centre, with support of European Commission, has started realization of the project “Exploiting the potentialities of CSOs and LAs for development of holistic prevention of drug and alcohol abuse among girls and women in lagging regions of Russia”.

One of the sharpest social problems in Russia is a high level of alcohol and drug abuse among women. The prevalence of substance use disorders among women and girls is 2-3 times higher in lagging regions than the average for the Russian Federation. Local and national authorities do not have the capacity to cope with the problem alone.  Inclusive participatory policy-making is needed. But adequately structured mechanisms, spaces for interactions, specific skills and competences, both on the side of CSOs and LAs, are insufficient.

So the action is aimed at:

- strengthening partnership and coordination between CSOs and LAs and imprevement of CSOs’ capacity to participate in and contribute to policy dialogue;

- improvement of CSOs capacity to participate in multi-actor partnerships, and increase of skills and knowledge of CSOs and LAs, relying largely on Nordic expertise on gender-sensitive primary prevention, treatment and support for girls and women, development of local gender-sensitive prevention and support programs, including special program for indigenous women.

The proposed action builds on development of Baltic NGO Network Against Drugs and BellaNet (National/International Network for Girl group leaders), bonding CSO networks for policy-making, and support of grassroots organisations in lagging regions.