The ENSA programme was launched in 2002, when the German Bundestag commissioned the Federal Government to create a "Development Youth Programme for Learning in Solidarity".
The Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) then commissioned the Development Policy Learning Workshop ASA (then part of InWEnt gGmbH) to develop a concept for a school exchange programme.
In spring 2005, the concept for ENSA was ready, and only six months later the first partnership between young people from Germany and young people from Kenya, Brazil, Peru, Senegal and South Africa, who were jointly involved in a street football project, was launched.