JOTA-JOTI 2017 60 Years Connecting Scouts

(Some of this information was taken from the JOTA-JOTI Official world Scouting website, www.jotajoti.info).

In 2017, the Jamboree on the Air and Jamboree on the Internet (JOTA/JOTI) weekend was on the 21^st and 22^nd October 2017. Scouts and Guides from New Zealand were able to talk to other Scouts and Guides around the world about Scouting and Guiding and to show the international aspects of our organisations, using amateur radio and safe internet chat rooms.

Jamboree on the Air and Jamboree on the Internet is an official international event of the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM). It is a programme event intended for young people in Scouting of all ages. The purpose of JOTA-JOTI is to enable and encourage Scouts around the world to communicate with one another by means of amateur radio and the internet, providing a fun and educational Scouting experience and promoting their sense of belonging to a worldwide Scout Movement.

At world level, JOTA-JOTI is coordinated by the World JOTA-JOTI Team (WJJT), led by a World JOTA-JOTI Coordinator (WJJC). The WJJT reports to the World Scout Committee and is supported by the World Scout Bureau.

JOTA-JOTI related activities take place simultaneously all around the world each year during the third weekend in October.  The programme for JOTA-JOTI consists both of activities developed at world level and initiatives developed at national and local level, supported by National JOTA-JOTI Coordinators and their respective teams.

The theme for 2017, “60 Years Connecting Scouts” recognized the start of the event in 1957 and commemorated its growth in participation and in the expanding communication channels that are activated during the event. Those channels include amateur radio via radio frequencies and Internet-based channels as well as many other Internet-based options including social media, ScoutLink and IRC chat services, Skype, and more.

For many years, New Zealand used the same basic design for JOTA and JOTI  badges (from 1993 for JOTA and 1998 for JOTI) but since 2016 the NZ design has been based on the official world logo. Many badges have been made for JOTA and JOTI around the world. I have shown here a selection of my JOTA-JOTI badges, mostly just one for each year.

This is another easy area for collecting, with many people in other countries interested in swapping for NZ JOTA-JOTI badges.

Rex Moir

The designer Carlos de Sá from Brazil commented:

"2017 Logo is based on the Scout's handshake around the globe (Earth), meaning connection and friendship among all Scouts in the world. Each handshake is shown as colored ribbon representing all type of culture and ethnic group. Hand on and down sustains the globe, the purple left hand seeks someone to be a new friend.”

Here are more JOTA-JOTI badges