Adrian Maître, the Deputy Director of the Department for Cooperation with Eastern Europe of SDC and Isak Skenderi, the Executive Director of VoRAE signed the contract for the implementation of a 3 year programme on Friday, 23 June 2017. This cooperation aims to improve the living conditions and contribute to the social inclusion of Roma, Ashkali, Egyptians and other vulnerable communities.
The initiative builds on the achievements and lessons learned of a previous phase, which resulted with considerable grassroot changes to the lives of these comunities. Thus, in the area of education, supplementary support was provided to over 4,000 primary school students through 22 learning and after-school centers in 11 municipalities and over 1,770 scholarships provided to secondary school students. In addition, housing conditions of 230 families were improved, as well as basic infrastructure for 1,700 people was upgraded.
In the period 2017-2019, the project will continue supporting activities in the areas of education and child protection, while particular emphasis will be put on institutionalising approaches with respective authorities. The project will be implemented by a consortium led by VoRAE, including two Swiss organisations, Hilfswerk der evangelischen Kirchen Schweiz (HEKS) and Terre des Hommes (TdH).
SDC contributes with CHF 1’200’000 to the implementation of this project, whose overall financial volume is CHF 3’800’000.