Romanian NGOs searching for a common vision
Project : Romania 21 Jul 2010
Bucharest, Romania: Romanian and international NGOs in the social sphere are trying to identify ways of collaboration to address the problems of the most vulnerable rural families. Following Terre des hommes’ invitation, specialists from the Roma Agency for Community Development “Impreuna”, AIDRom Foundation, Pestalozzi Children Foundation Switzerland and Romania, World Vision, Ovidiu Rom Association, PACT Foundation and the National Federation of NGOs acting on Child Protection gathered in Bucharest for a one day Round Table (15th of July 2010).
Although not singular, this type of initiative raised interest among the NGOs invited, as it may become an alternative strategy for answering the difficulties created by the decrease of reforming interventions the state should have implemented into the Romanian social protection system.
In spite of the different funding opportunities, the lack of strong coordination and the dissolution of some significant National Authorities (including that on Child Protection) put the Romanian civil society in a challenging position. In this delicate context, Terre des hommes may bring a partial contribution to the improvement of the segmented picture of the interventions in favour of the disadvantaged families and children in the rural areas.
The complementary action carried on at the national level in Bucharest opens a dialogue based on a concrete proposal of Model of action elaborated by Terre des hommes and presented to some significant NGOs to build a cooperative way for its planning and implementation. Its main goals of empowering the existing social system and actors from the rural communities enhanced the importance of the common contribution coming from the NGOs different field experience and competences. The meeting outlined the basis of a future common proposal that should include actions linked to social and child protection policies, risk prevention, education, social inclusion of families (especially of the Roma ones), community development and training of trainers. The researched complementarity of domains becomes therefore not only a strategy of building a significant proposal for accessing future funds, but mostly that of including child protection issues in a holistic vision addressing different problems that lead to child abuse, school abandonment, risky migration or trafficking.
The discussion on the multidisciplinary Model of action proposed placed Terre des hommes in the position of a linking actor and succeeded in gathering consensus of the key specialists on the need of a common simultaneous intervention. In order to develop the results of this first encounter, in the near future Terre des hommes will organize bilateral meeting with each partner interested to define concrete complementarities of interventions in the communities that will be chosen for the testing phase. The communication and a second Round Table will enable these NGOs to discuss on the possible synergies between them in the frame of the Model of action completed by all the future partners.
If this initiative will lead to the organization of a mixed working group, a planning team with a specialist from each NGO partner will elaborate a common Model of action and implementation strategies that will be sustained by the larger team with a line of lobby and advocacy.
While maintaining the program in some rural communities from the Dolj county, the strategy of reuniting specialized competences together defines the new working phase of Terre des hommes Romania. It may also be the key to a wider impact of its presence in this country where numerous children and families from the rural areas still need strong social protection interventions and sustainable rehabilitation models able to address the state of extreme poverty. [CC]
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