EKONET Promotion of the Internet among the Environmental CSO   EKONET started as an informal group for electronic communication consisting of members from 4 environmental civil society organizations (FOMEK - Skopje, Proaktiva - Skopje, Biosfera - Bitola and Planetum - Strumica) in January 2002, with support from the Milieukontakt office in Macedonia. In November 2003 EKONET gained a legal status and became the official Centre for Electronic Communication - EKONET. EKONET mission and goal is: promoting the Internet as away of fast and efficient communication among the civil society organizations (CSO) working in the field of environment, the institutions and the interested citizens in order to increase the influence that the environmental CSO have in their immediate surrounding and on global level. EKONET enables the environmental CSO to present their activities to the broader public, exchange information among themselves and make that information available to all interested. EKONET realizes its goals through the following activities: Maintaining the web portal www.eko.net.mk which is updated regularly and contains relevant information related to environmental questions. It is a user-oriented site, which means that all interested can register on-line and become part of an Internet community. This option not only enables access to the portal's contents, but also an access to the tools and services that are there on it. Moreover, all registered members get the privilege to place their own contents and information. (At the moment the portal has 335 registered administrators). Distribution of eco-news through a distribution list, which presently has 965 members (environmental NGO, institutions working in the field of environment, interested citizen, as well as the business sector which has certain links with the protection and promotion of the environment. The number of members on the distribution list is constantly growing, and what is especially important is that it includes all CSO from RM working in the field of environment and there is a continuous flow of information of interest to its users. Publishing a bulletin: (we do this in order to make the information available to those who do not have access to the Internet any time - which is understandable regarding the fact that we live in Macedonia). Readers of the bulletin are members of environmental CSO, all 123 units of the local government, relevant institutions and the business-sector. Trainings for members of environmental CSO on using the Internet. Last year we organized 16 trainings in 15 towns in Macedonia, including members of environmental CSO who received training for both basic use of the Internet and for using the web portal www.eko.net.mk in terms of registering, placing various information and contents. The trainings covered 200 members of almost all active environmental CSO in Macedonia. At the moment, the Centre for Electronic Communication EKONET has five partners: EA Flora - Kriva Palanka, Green Power - Veles, Vinozito - Stip, Areal - Struga and Izgrev - Sveti Nikole (for which EKONET provided technical support of 5 computers and Internet - packages (30 hours of free Internet including the telephone units), as well as continuous cooperation with the Journalist Legal Centre - ERINA, so on the web portal (in the legislation part) there is a part for legal on-line advice offered by ERINA. The Centre for Electronic Communication EKONET offers the following services: Trainings for using the Internet and computer skills, designed according to the customers needs Web-design, preparation and maintenance of web-sites and portals.