Tibor Béres

Under the ‘My Own Kitchen Garden’ programme, disadvantaged families were given the opportunity to take up gardening by acquiring quality seeds and plant protection products. During implementation, some 2,890 families took part in the programme with the involvement of 62 organisations. With expert support, participants acquired up-to-date knowledge of gardening and plant protection, and in many cases were tending their gardens for the first time.

The Swiss–Hungarian Civil Society and Scholarship Fund operated between 2012 and 2015, focusing specifically on strengthening the civil society sector and supporting disadvantaged students. Over the course of three years, 111 projects were implemented with funding of more than 1.3 billion forints: of the 102 civil society projects supported, 67 were in the field of social services and 35 dealt with environmental protection. Under nine scholarship programmes, 679 disadvantaged students received support.

Our Eltáv programme, run in partnership with the Katona József Theatre, aimed to strengthen and support the community living in the Szúcs mining settlement. The project launched theatre education sessions involving both children from the settlement and students from Budapest. For the adults, alongside arts and community programmes, a financial development programme was launched, house renovations were carried out using donations, and community spaces were refurbished with corporate support.

The Autonómia Foundation, in cooperation with the Ökotárs Foundation, the Foundation for the Development of Democratic Rights and the Carpathian Foundation-Hungary, managed the EEA/Norwegian Financial Mechanism Civil Society Support Fund, which supported Hungarian civil society organisations in four thematic areas: environmental protection; capacity building for civil society organisations; social cohesion, child and health protection; and cultural heritage.

Pilot projects in four different European Union Member States aimed to promote small-scale savings among low-income households. The Hungarian SIMS project implemented, tested and compared three different financial, educational and development methods: CAF, Esélykassza and IDA. As part of this, we explored the possibilities for adapting the CAF method, which was previously unknown in Hungary.

The aim of the project was to enable children and their families living in small settlements with large Roma populations to learn the basics of subsistence-oriented, environmentally conscious farming through theoretical and practical training. The programme involved the creation of school kitchen gardens, where participants grew their own fruit and vegetables, thereby contributing to the provision of food for the school kitchens.

As part of the programme, we developed policy recommendations in various fields important for Roma integration (project support services, local economic development, financial development and settlement clearance programmes). The programme included workshops where the draft documents were put forward for discussion; the finalised documents, taking into account the feedback received, were then forwarded to policy-makers.

As part of the research, we examined whether developments funded by domestic and European Union resources had a noticeable positive impact on the opportunities of local residents, particularly in relation to child poverty. Summarising the results of case studies conducted in 15 localities as part of the methodology, we analysed projects implemented primarily in the field of public education in terms of project types, problems encountered during implementation and effectiveness.

In the project in Bonyhád, we tested the IDA (Individual Development Account) method, which aims to strengthen financial awareness and planning in low-income households. Participants who saved regularly each month into their own bank accounts received a so-called supplementary grant at the end of the savings period, and also took part in training sessions designed to improve their financial and legal knowledge.

The programme was launched with the aim of ensuring that European Union funds earmarked for Roma integration reach the regions where Roma people live. We developed grant applications locally with Roma minority local authorities, civil society organisations and local communities that responded to our call for proposals. We supported our winning partners through mentoring and additional support.

A hundred proposals were submitted, of which forty were successful, totalling five million euros.

The aim of the programme was to strengthen financial awareness and more systematic budgeting in low-income households. The programme was based on the IDA method, which is popular in the United States: participants saved money on a monthly basis in their own bank accounts, and this was matched by a grant of the same amount, helping them to achieve their savings goals. A condition for receiving the grant was participation in the financial training sessions that formed part of the programme.