Project “Social integration and meaningful participation of disadvantaged families in an inclusive society”
Project implementation period: September 2018 – November 2019
The project is funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers
Project is implemented in partnership between the the Danish Red Cross, Belarus Red Cross and the Latvian Red Cross.
The project aims to strengthen Red Cross capacities in social inclusion and empowerment for enhancing community resilience, through activities with disadvantaged families, local authorities and other actors.
The project specific objective: strengthening relations, raising capacities and sharing experiences among people and organisations from Denmark, Latvia and Belarus through cross-border cooperation on social inclusion and empowerment of disadvantaged families.
The project builds on positive experiences of the Danish Red Cross in supporting vulnerable families in a creative, inclusive and empowering manner. Families who struggle with difficult life circumstances are in the focus of attention. The objectives of family support groups are to provide a break in a challenging everyday life, to strengthen resilience to cope with life crises and difficult living conditions (unemployment, illness, divorce, etc.), to strengthen social networks and improve children’s wellbeing.
The Danish Red Cross will share its materials and methodology, which will be adapted to the partners’ contexts and will be piloted in selected regions. The Danish Red Cross family support model will be piloted in Grodno region of Belarus and Daugavpils city branch of Latvia.
Through this project, target families and volunteers will acquire and develop new skills and create new social networks that will improve their human and social capital. Project beneficiaries will be supported in overcoming vulnerabilities, stigmatization and exclusion. They will furthermore benefit from awareness raising activities and will have opportunities to build their capacities and raise their voices through engagement in volunteering.
Through its cross-border approach the project offers a platform for exchange of experiences, methods and approaches gained in the Danish Red Cross, the Latvian Red Cross and the Belarus Red Cross. This exchange is expected to draw on existing competences and further strengthen capacities among all partners involved. As the project involves cross-border networking and capacity building, it will create ties from Belarus across Latvia to the Nordic countries and thereby contribute to international communication between volunteers in the Nordic-Baltic region.
The project seeks to achieve the following outcomes:
- The Belarus Red Cross and the Latvian Red Cross have strengthened their capacities within service provision to disadvantaged families and cooperation with local authorities and other stakeholders on family support issues;
- At least 80 Red Cross staff and volunteers use specific knowledge on family support gained through peer to peer learning and trainings;
- Best practices from the project have been collected and disseminated to the Red Cross Movement partners and other stakeholders in Belarus, Latvia and Denmark;
- At least six family support groups are established and functioning in Grodno region and two family support groups in Daugavpils.
Contact person for the Latvian Red Cross: Evija Eglīte, Phone: + 371 67336653, E-mail: evija.eglite@redcross.lv
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
19.08.2019.
Partner meeting of the project “Social inclusion and meaningful participation of disadvantaged families in an inclusive society” in Daugavpils
Within the framework of the project “Social inclusion and meaningful participation of disadvantaged families in an inclusive society”, a partner meeting was organized in Daugavpils on 15 August with representatives of the Latvian Red Cross Headquarter and the Daugavpils City branch, as well as representatives of the Belarus Red Cross Society in Minsk and Grodno.
During the meeting, the project progress in Daugavpils and Grodno was discussed, as well as the results achieved and planned activities for the future. In the end of August, volunteers from the Daugavpils City branch of the Latvian Red Cross, who actively participated in the project implementation, and one of the families involved in the project will go to a week-long camp in Grodno to meet with families involved in the project.
