General – Page 39 – ERGO Network

ERGO Network has a new website!

With this newsletter, we present you our new website – more structured, more colourful and with a lot more content than before. We will regularly update the website with news from our members and institutional developments, upload documents, inform about ERGO projects and campaigns and update ERGO’s membership list.

Browse through ERGO’s and our members policy papers and find institutional policy documents on the Resources page.

Find out which organisations belong to the network on the Membership page.

Read more about ERGO’s work in the fields of Monitoring, Networking, Campaigning and Empowering.

We hope that you like the new online portal of ERGO Network and will be a regular visitor.

Roma civil society working group meeting in Brussels

From 20-22 September, ERGO’s members involved in our Annual Work Programme under DG Employment, met in Brussels for their third Roma Civil Society Working Group Meeting. Important issues were on the agenda: The group gave input into ERGO’s work programme on employment and social inclusion for the next four years, evaluated the cooperation of the past years together with an external evaluator and built relations with desk officers of the European Commission Directorate Generals for Employment and Social Affairs and Regional and Urban Policy.

ERGO’s members from Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Czech Republic and Slovakia are cooperating with the ERGO Network secretariat in Brussels since 2014 in the framework of the project ‘Roma Included: Roma recognised as equal stakeholders in the policies targeting them’. In 2017, the organisations continue to coordinate national Roma coalitions in their countries, build the capacity of grassroots NGOs and Local Action Groups to benefit from the community-led local development process and take part in a common research project on Roma youth employment. The results of this year’s work will be disseminated by the end of the year.

RARC is a member of the Slovak Committee for the Prevention and Elimination of Racism

Zuzana Havirova as a representative of ERGO member Roma Advocacy and Research Centre (RARC) recently became a member of the Slovak Committee for the Prevention and Elimination of Racism, Xenophobia, Antisemitism and other forms of Intolerance. The Committee belongs to the Ministry of Interior of the Slovak Republic.

The Committee is the only advisory body of the Government of the Slovak Republic that specifically addresses the prevention and elimination of racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and other forms of intolerance in society.

The Committee’s main ambition is to be a platform for coordinating activities, defining priorities and guidelines for the development of public policies aimed at the prevention and elimination of racism, xenophobia and extremism. At the same time, the Committee is an appropriate tool for the exchange of information between representatives of the public administration, the self-government and civil society, which will help to solve the issues within the Committee’s material scope.

Roma Advocacy and Research Center became a member of the National Rural Development Network of the Slovak Republic

Roma Advocacy and Research Center became a member of the National Rural Development Network of the Slovak Republic

On 24 May 2017 RAVS ERGO Network, member became an official member of the National Rural Development Network of the Slovak Republic (NSRF SR). NSRF SR associates the organizations and administrative bodies involved in rural development and the implementation of the PRV SR 2014-2020 in the sense of Art. 55 of Regulation (EU) No. 1305/2013 on support for rural development by the EPFRV and Art. 5 principles of partnership and multilevel governance of Regulation (EU) No. 1303/2013.

NSRF SR directly cooperates with the Ministry of Agriculture and rural development of the Slovak Republic (MPRV SR) and the European Network for Rural Development. Through this partnership Roma people will be involved more actively in the implementation of the programs under the Community Local Led Development in Slovakia.

Read more about RAVS activity in Slovak language here

3rd National Meeting of Roma Forum Romania

3^rd National Meeting of Roma Forum Romania

The National Meeting of Roma Forum organized by Nevo Parudimos, as a member of ERGO Network in partnership with Romani Criss, took place from 10-11 May in Bucharest.

The theme of the meeting was „The involvement of Roma NGOs for the Romanian Presidency of the EU in 2019”. More than 30 Roma NGOs participated to the meeting and over 60 people were present during the 2 days. In the same time, officials from the National Roma Agency, the National Roma Contact Point, the National Federations of LAGs, representatives of the Roma Education Fund, the Ministry of Employment and the Central European University gave presentations and talked about Roma issues in open and free discussions.

The main discussions focused on the list of several proposals for the Romanian Presidency of the European Union in 2019 in order to be formalized in the public agenda during the Romanian presidency. These proposals refer to the following important areas: school segregation, the mediation process for health and education and forced eviction of the Roma.