Short description of The Banaterra Project
The Banat is a well-defined historical region in South-Eastern Europe, whose teritory was split in 1919, with two thirds assigned to Romania, a third to The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (in today's in Serbia) and about one percent to Hungary. Almost 30 nationalities, of different religion beliefs and cultures, live in the historical Banat. The Banaterra project was started by Project Ratsko Asociation in Timisoara. More than 40 specialists from all over the world contribute to the development of the project. 
The Banaterra Project, a becoming encyclopedia of the historical Banat, with information about peoples and places from past and present Banat, aims to promote national cultures and their personalities; to become a public place where local people of different nationalities, cultures and confessions can gather respecting each other's national values but also their political and administrative boundaries. 

Long description of  The Banaterra Project
The Banat is a historical region in South-East Europe, with a distinct and a relatively well defined identity. It is naturally bordered by rivers Mures and Tisa, Danube and the Timis-Cerna corridor. Almost 30 different ethnic groups live here, of different confessions, and belonging to different cultures. In the past, the region has been under Hungarian, Austrian and Ottoman Empire administration. The economy of the region recorded an important expansion under the Habsburg Empire administration, when the region was used for introducing all sorts of inventions of the time. As a result, a handful of regional, national, European and world wide first issue of inventions and events was recorded in the Banat. 
The region Banat used to count on 28526 km2 . In 1919, after the World War One, the region was split between Romania, (with 18966 km2 , approximately 2/3 of the total), the Kingdom of Serbian, Croatians and Slovenians (which got 9276 km2 approximately 1/3 of total), and Hungary, with 284 km2 (approximately 1% of total). The cultural and economic center of the region is Timisoara, one of the biggest in Romania and the first Romanian city to be declared “free of communism”, being the place where the Romanian Revolution of 1989 started. 
During the communist regime in Romania, history lessons in schools used to minimize the historical, economical, social and cultural importance of the Banat region. The same regime, has induced the idea, that the Banat has no people of culture – a complete false approach. At the same time, German ethnics and Jews massively left the Banat. In order to complete the destruction of the local, Banat specific identity, the authorities encouraged thousands and thousands of people from other communities and regions from Romania, (Yugoslavia in the case of Serbian Banat) to settle here. At the same time, thousands of the locals have been sent in exile, either in Russia or in the Baragan steppe (south-eastern Romania). 
In this context, the non-governmental and non-profit organization Project Rastko Romania, from Timisoara, was started in 2004, as a part of the global cultural network Rastko Project (www.rastko.net) and, through this partner of the Project Gutenberg Europe (http://pge.rastko.net/) . The Banaterra project was initiated by Dusan Baiski (www.dusanbaiski.eu), writer and journalist from Timisoara, president of the Romanian Project Rastko Association . He is developing the Romanian language section. To his initiative few other people decided to join for other languages : Kladiva Ottmar (Hungary, Hungarian language), Aca Spaso Mladenovski (Serbia, Serbian language), Doru Eugen Popin (Germany, German language) Nick Markov (Romania, Bulgarian language), Radu Trifan (Italy, English language). 
The team is made up of more than 40 people, which have academic studies, in different areas, and come from different places in the world. 
Partners for this project are as follow: Romanian Television – Timisoara section, Central University Library “Eugen Todoran”- Timisoara, Hungarian Technical Library BME-OMMIK – Budapest, Timis County Library, Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture Timisoara, City Library “Tata Oancea” from Bocsa, Marineasa and ArtPress printing house from Timisoara, and Serbian union from Romania. 
The Banaterra Project, a potential encyclopedia of the historical Banat, with information about people and places from yesterday and today’s Banat region, has a few important goals: to promote the nationalities and personalities of the respective cultures; to restore documents and pictures of the banatian values into the European and World Wide circuit, to restore identity and esteem of the Banat, into a European Union of regions; to become the place for cultural, confessional and national convergence for all people living here, with respect for their national values and political and administrative borders. 

Favourite path through project: 
The main index of the website www.banaterra.eu allows internet users to choose the language they favour. Each national section has its specific flag. The most developed is the romanian section. At this stage, each section has a different content, as they are not mere translations from one language to another. The sections have their own content, which better represent the respectve nation from the historical Banat (places, personalities, traditions, etc.). Each distinct letter takes the user to an index of subjects, with a short description to each of them and links to the pages dedicated to the subjects (which then comprise text, images, documents, books, etc.). Some folders, like „Expositions” and „Maps” can be used by all the sections of the website.  Because of their size, video and audio files are hosted on third party webistes. „The Banat Library” is a separate section where you can find entire books, either in .doc or .pdf format, which can be freely downloaded. Images are either small or big and they can be taken and published in the mass-media. After having accumulated a certain amount of material, for each national section, a massive effort of translating will be undertaken, in order to allow a better understanding of each other’s ethnic group. 

Installation procedure of The Banaterra Project
First we identify the owners of documents and of new or old images about people or places in the Banat. When necessary, we ask for written permission from the copyright owners, in order to fully comply with current legislation. Works are then scanned, edited to suit the specific goal (character recognition, editing images, etc.). We then continue to select  people who want to get involved at digitalisation and archiving work on the Banaterra website (www.banaterra.eu), based on voluntary subscription. We also select administrators.
We keep in contact with the local and national mass-media and we inform them about those aspects  that are of public interest.
Online access is completely free. 
In the future, digital content from the project will be made available on DVD, either the full content, either by language of interest, an will be sold both online and in shops. 

Special technical requirements
The project can be accessed on the internet at the following address: www.banaterra.eu. The recommended browser is Internet Explorer. Minimum PC configuration required: Pentium III, 128 MB RAM, medium video card, audio card. A DVD reader is required for DVD playback. 

Short description of the reason for production
The Banaterra project purpose is:
- to facilitate connection between peoples, between exponents of the many ethnic groups living in the Banat;
- knowing each nationality’s history and culture;
- reducing smaller or bigger misunderstandings existing today;
- to put some light into the things that better represent each ethnic group;
- to let people know and learn those elements that allowed Banat’s specific interethnic harmony;
- saving the spiritual values from being forgotten, by putting back into the stream documents, images, books, etc. that otherwise wouldn’t get through to the public;
- putting certain things a different perspective;
- favouring, through knowledge, the specific activities of South-Eastern Europe;
- to help promote tourism in the historical Banat;
- revitalizing links between authors, etc.