Our expertise

The work carried out by Louvain Coopération and its partners covers a number of thematic areas, including agroecology and natural resources, entrepreneurship and socio-professional integration, non-communicable diseases and social protection, global citizenship and service learning.

We pay particular attention to gender, environmental integration, partnership relations, the human rights approach and capacity building. Beyond these thematic distinctions, the actions of Louvain Coopération and its partners often combine several themes and explore the challenges of interdisciplinarity. They are also careful to take into account and build on the knowledge of civil society organisations and local associations.

This transdisciplinary approach in our programmes aims to promote concrete and sustainable social change.

Agroecology

Louvain Coopération aims to develop sustainable and equitable food and farming systems through an integrated approach combining ecological and social principles, in order to optimise interactions between plants, animals, humans and the environment. Our actions promote the autonomy of producers, agricultural groups and cooperatives, with particular attention paid to the rights of women, young people and indigenous peoples.

Natural resources

Louvain Coopération contributes to the sustainable management of natural resources by working to preserve and/or restore natural areas, promote value chains that improve ecosystem services and improve governance in the management of natural resources. Our actions also encourage the participation of women in economic life linked to natural resources and promote socio-ecological resilience, particularly in mangroves and within national parks and nature reserves.

Entrepreneurship

Louvain Coopération supports entrepreneurial initiatives by supporting non-financial business development service structures or mechanisms and by linking entrepreneurs with financial services through the promotion of self-managed micro-credit savings schemes or existing micro-credit institutions.

Socio-professional integration

Louvain Coopération promotes the personal, social and economic development of individuals, with a view to their empowerment. In our actions, professional integration takes place in urban areas, with children and young adults living on the streets of the DRCongo. In rural or peri-urban areas, it complements support for entrepreneurship, by promoting apprenticeship systems through professional immersion.

Non-communicable diseases
(mental health, diabetes, hypertension)

Louvain Coopération is involved in the prevention and medical and psycho-social management of these diseases at primary healthcare level, through training and monitoring of medical, paramedical and social staff, and works within communities by developing awareness-raising initiatives aimed at supporting patients and reducing the stigma attached to these diseases.

World citizenship

Louvain Coopération encourages citizens to get involved in building a fair, sustainable, inclusive and supportive global society, with a particular focus on the imbalances between the so-called South and North countries. We work actively with students at the UCLouvain to strengthen individual and collective action. The main themes covered by Louvain Coopération are feminism, ecology, anti-racism and decolonisation.

Service-learning

Louvain Coopération and the UCLouvain are implementing a service-learning approach through the IngénieuxSud project-course. They also aim to contribute to the development of teaching and research on Ethical Service Learning, in order to deploy the full potential of students and socio-economic actors in a perspective of environmental and social transition.

Cross-cutting themes

Gender

Louvain Coopération adopts relevant strategies that help to reduce inequalities between men and women in the programmes implemented. We base our actions concerning the gender approach on the stories, knowledge and interests of men and women throughout the action for change, valuing the experience and dynamic and complex knowledge of local movements and strengthening the participation of men, women and young people.

Environmental integration

Louvain Coopération aims to ensure that human activities take account of, make rational use of and preserve natural resources. In our projects, environmental integration is based on the "EIT-Environmental Integration Tool" approach, which involves both macro-level thinking, at the level of the programmes implemented, via the EIT-Programme, and micro-level thinking, accompanying the productive or economic initiatives supported, via the EIT-Producer.

Capacity building

Louvain Coopération and its partners put in place teaching methods adapted to the target groups, the issues and the contexts. We see capacity building as an endogenous and complex process.

We work with our partners on the following three interdependent levels: individual, organisational and institutional. We extend our actions from the quantifiable and visible aspects (material and financial resources, etc.) to the qualitative and less visible aspects (vision, strategy, values, etc.).

Human rights

Louvain Coopération implements a human rights approach that seeks to ensure that everyone has the opportunity and capacity to make political, economic and social choices, and that governments are willing and able to fulfil their obligations and guarantee the fundamental rights and freedoms of their people. According to the human rights approach, poverty and development are no longer thought of in terms of identifying needs, but rather by analysing the causes of poverty from a human rights perspective in order to identify the major obstacles to sustainable development and what can be done to remedy them.

Partnership

Louvain Coopération implements a partnership approach at different levels and throughout the project cycle. The intensity of the relationship with each partner can vary and is mainly aimed at mutual capacity building, cross-fertilisation and operational intermediation to achieve the desired changes.