Republic of Moldova

An innovative mechanism allowed employing over 1700 people

Chişinău, 30 September 2010 – An innovative mechanism implemented by the “Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project enabled employment of 1700 people. Moreover, due to the same mechanism 704 new jobs were created. Approximately 7 thousand socially vulnerable people were provided housing, counselling and life skills development opportunities within a network of 10 social reintegration centres and maternal centres created within the project. These are only some of the results obtained by the “Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project during six years of activity, results that have been made public today during a totalization conference.

Ms. Valentina Buliga, Minister of Labour, Social Protection and Family; Ms. Kaarina Immonen, UN Resident Coordinator in Moldova; Mr. Asif Chaudhry, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States to Moldova; Mr. Mihai Blaj, Secretary I of Embassy of Romania in R. Moldova; Mr. Jonas Rolett, Regional Director for Southern, Central and Eastern Europe, Open Society Institute - Washington DC, representatives of international organizations accredited in Chisinau, representatives of local authorities, NGOs and business people, partners of the project have participated at the conference.  

            Six years ago, „Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project aimed to develop support services for the social, economic and professional integration of graduates from boarding schools, orphans or young people deprived of family care, of mothers with children and of pregnant women at risk or in crisis situation. This goal was achieved through ensuring housing in specially equipped centres, providing conditions similar to the family environment, psycho-social counselling, independent life skills development, through mediation activities and facilitation of beneficiaries’ access to the labour market, through financial and material support. 

            „When we see, that in the localities where maternal centres have been established, child abandonment decreased and in the communities where we have formation and professional integration services the rate of employment of young specialists is increasing, particularly during an economic crisis, we can talk about the true success of the project. The success is due to a good and sustainable cooperation between the Government, the non-governmental sector and the private one, local public administration and donors”, declared Kaarina Immonen, UN Resident Coordinator in Moldova within the totalization conference.

            Valentina Buliga, the Minister of Labour, Social Protection and Family, attending the conference stated that the project contributed to the development of services which are absolutely necessary to communities in the Republic of Moldova and the insurance of social guarantees for people in difficulty. „The projects help us to understand, to change our attitude, to develop services and standards and to monitor, but subsequently, we have to overtake the good practices and develop them”, Valentina Buliga added.    

             “Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project has greatly contributed to the development of the idea of social enterprise in the Republic of Moldova. This is due to the financial and logistic support provided by partner NGOs for the establishment and development of social enterprises. The applied mechanism allowed generating new jobs for socially vulnerable groups, the profit obtained from these enterprises being reinvested in social activities”, stated Ion Babici, director of a social enterprise from Soroca, within the totalization conference.   

Viorel Albu, the manager of the “Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project mentioned that another method of generating new jobs successfully implemented within the project was the cooperation with the private sector. On one hand the project provided grants to the partners for new job creation and on the other hand the contribution of the project was expressed through the identification of beneficiaries, professional orientation, covering of education costs and, if necessary, co-funding of salaries for the first working months of the beneficiaries. Viorel Albu added in his presentation that among project achievements, besides 10 social reintegration centres and 9 education and professional integration services, there are also 9 social enterprises and 18 funded businesses, tenths of partnerships with the private sector, over 65 specialists from the social and child protection field educated to provide support to beneficiaries. Within the project 2054 young people attended professional formation courses. “In project implementation process the most difficult was not to create 10 local centres, but to ensure the sustainability of these services. Sustainability means both financial self-sufficiency, as well as institutional capacity strengthening. I am proud that during project implementation we have succeeded in achieving these objectives”, Viorel Albu concluded.      

"Better Opportunities for Youth and Women” Project is implemented by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in partnership with the Government of the Republic of Moldova, with the financial support of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) under the United States’ Global Anti-Trafficking presidential initiative, the Government of Romania and SOROS Foundation Moldova. The overall budget of the project is 5.2 million US dollars.

Contact: Viorel Albu, project manager, tel. + (373 22) 29 47 71; e-mail: viorel.albu@undp.org or Natalia Costas, communication consultant, GSM: 069221141; e-mail: ncostash@yahoo.com