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The next step will be the design of a communication campaign to inform on the risks of illegal migration managed by smugglers, on the alternative migration channels and on the opportunities in the country.

In the past weeks, the field research (Work Package 2) foreseen by the AwArtMali project was carried out by the ISMU Foundation. The research had the objective to prepare the designing phase of the communication campaign to inform Malians about the risks of illegal migration managed by smugglers and on the existing opportunities in the country. The research aimed at identifying the target of the campaign, its characteristics, motivations, needs and modalities of access to media and information. The research was elaborated through the collection of data from a selected group, institutions, associations and people, that work in the field of migration in Mali. Thanks to the interviews led by ISMU, stories and testimonies have been collected directly among local Malian communities. Starting from the data and information collected, it will be possible to elaborate the information campaign addressed to the Malian population, and organized by the project partner Giusti Eventi, an agency specialized on communication for the no-profit sector and social campaigns, that will collaborate with a Malian communication agency, thus granting the development of the outputs of the campaign accordingly to the real needs of the target selected in the territory. At the same time, a video-documentary will be produced, and it will be preparatory to build the travelling theatrical performance that will be enacted in 20 Malian villages.

The activities that took place will therefore function as the starting point for the development of the following ones (Working Package 3), that foresee the creation of a strategic communication plan that will allow to design an operative plan for the Campaign, which is going to be monitored throughout the entire implementation.
The Missions were carried out in the area surrounding the Malian city of Kati, a town at the periphery of the Capital city of Bamako, in the Kulikoro region. The team of researchers from ISMU, coordinated by Professor Caselli and formed by researchers Luca Merotta, Giorgia Papavero, Tamara Ferrari, Sara Martinez Damia and Francesco Marini, worked through several phases. The first phase was carried out in Italy, by collecting quantitative data on the Malian diaspora members living in Italy and interviewing them, as well as the institutional representatives. Simultaneosly, an equivalent research was carried out in Spain by our partners Instrategies, during the months of February and March 2019. The results of this first phase will permit to open a discussion about instruments, policies and actions needed to improve migration management. The second one consisted in the mission carried out from March 9th to March 17th on the field, coordinated by researcher Luca Merotta.

During this mission, meetings and interviews with key stakeholders (institutions and international agencies) were carried out, and they served to collect their point of view and approach to the issue of migration in Mali. The third phase was implemented during the mission that took place from March 23rd to April 1st and was led by Tamara Ferrari and Sara Martinez Damia, who came in contact and interviewed the population of 10 villages.
This research phase was crucial to understand the motivations and the dynamics among people and to investigate the perspectives of those who choose to flee the country, examining the level of consciousness of these subjects with regard to the risks and their level of information on the real perspectives of development and growth in their own country. Among the interviewed there were: local political authorities, religious authorities, representatives from cultural and political associations, youth workers, school and education representatives, supervisors of NGOs working on the issues of migration and youth life condition. The research analysed the existing situation in Mali, and the factors that encourage people to flee. The missions progressed positively, and the team of researchers was satisfied by the reception they received and by the organizational support given by LE TONUS.

The AwArtMali project wishes to create consciousness on the risks of migration among the Malian population and the migrants from neighboring countries crossing Malian territory, and to inform them on the economic opportunities existing in Mali. It is a project financed by the DG Home Affairs, DG Home Affairs, Migration and Security Funds, Financial Resources and Monitoring, Union actions through the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF). The project is coordinated by Tamat, an NGO that has been working for 20 years in the field of international and decentralized cooperation, in partnership with ISMU Foundation (Institute for the Studies of Multiethnicity), Giusti Eventi, communication agency based in Turin and specialized in designing campaigns that address the social and no-profit sectors, and the cultural association Farneto Teatro. AwArtMali also includes two Spanish partners, Congenia and Instrategies, active in the promotion of opportunities for migrants and in the development of economic ventures, as well as the Cypriot partner Cardet, a non-profit organization specialized in research and development of technological implementations for training and information of migrant people.