About us

Estonian Village Movement Kodukant

The NGO Estonian Village Movement Kodukant unites associations that value village life. The aim of Kodukant is to promote community-based activities in rural areas by valuing and developing village life, traditional culture and voluntary activities.

The village movement started with the people living in the villages and their needs, and gained momentum after the restoration of independence. The decision to create a joint umbrella organisation was taken in 1996 at the first Estonian Villages Day and the Estonian Village Movement Kodukant was founded in 1997.

The villages had to put their heads to work and start working together to keep their spirits up. The village fools became the leaders in a good sense, and today we call them the spark people – the ones who encouraged us to stick together, tidy up the village, organise events. In a situation where there was barely enough to put bread on the table, they managed to convince people that the village had to live. And the people stayed.

Mikk Sarv was the spiritual father of the village movement, originally called the Estonian Movement of Villages and Small Towns Kodukant. He was the one who brought the good idea of how to support self-initiative activities in villages from Sweden and, together with the Swedish village movement, sowed the seed in Estonia. From that time to this day, he remains the guiding light of the village movement: “All Estonia must live!”

People have always been the key to the village movement. Strong, kind, positive, supportive and enterprising people who stay in the countryside despite difficulties and difficult situations. These are the people to keep!

If you wander around Estonia, you will notice the many well-maintained village centres and swinging places, flagpoles, signs and maps. There are over three hundred active village centres. You can’t do without entrepreneurship in the countryside. We bring together more than 600 legal and natural persons through the members of the regional umbrella organisations.

The association was founded in 1997

  • originally called the Movement of Estonian Villages and Small Towns Kodukant, the spiritual father of the association was Mikk Sarv.

"All Estonia must live!"

  • is the cornerstone of the village movement

In the early days of the Kodukandi, the village movement was mainly male-driven. Village elders were also older men. Today, things are different – with the emergence of village associations, active women came into the village movement, and today it is mostly women who lead village life. There are also a number of strong young families who, appreciating the closeness to nature and the good environment for their children to grow up in, have moved to the countryside and taken up village life by the horns.

Much has been done in the villages with the help of EU projects and structural funds, but today people are already eagerly looking for ways to manage on their own. In addition, village associations are also active in all aspects of village life, not just in organising Midsummer or Christmas parties. They are actively involved in organising all kinds of services, be it waste collection, training courses or the like. Opportunities are sought for micro-enterprise, for self-employment. However, activity is certainly more at local, village and parish level, and less at county level.

There is a desire to pursue a cause in Estonia that has substance and makes a difference in the local area.

In the organisation we value

openness and transparency

fostering a sense of community cohesion and cooperation between communities.

developing the entrepreneurial spirit of rural people

principles of environmentally sustainable development

All Estonia must live!

Estonian Village Movement Kodukant

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