Within the European Union, the inclusion of migrants in terms of employment, education and social outcomes amongst others is taken into consideration at the local, national and European levels. Distinct policies and frameworks have been created and implemented over the years to improve the migrants’ inclusion in the European Union. However, migrants are still vulnerable and encounter challenges and inequalities in their integration process in the different countries of the Union.
In this light, the European Pact for Integration (EPI) was launched in January 2020 and will last until the end of June 2022. EPI is a project that aims to improve the quality of existing pro-migrant inclusion in local strategies. The project is funded by the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) of the European Union and is supported by 13 partner institutions from Romania, Spain, Germany, Sweden, Poland, Italy, Latvia and Estonia. The project, which goal is to generate a comprehensive set of actions leading to the definition and implementation of strategies for enhanced integration of TCN, Third Countries Nationals, is taking place in 7 European cities: Cartagena, Cluj-Napoca, Dietzenbach, Linkoping, Lublin, Ravenna, and Riga.
Its general objective is to facilitate the exchange of knowledge between the 7 aforementioned cities so as to establish a European Pact that will foster integration of migrants locally. As a result, efficient strategies addressing for instance the inclusion, housing, access to basic services’ issues; including health services, cultural exchanges and integration into the labour market will be developed and carried out.
Kick-Off Meeting and Capacity Building Workshop
On 4th February 2020, the Kick-off meeting of the European Pact for Integration was hosted in Cluj-Napoca, Romania where the Peace Action, Training and Research Institute of Romania (PATRIR) welcomed the partners. They participated in the discussion of the EPI project status and strategy, but also of the management and dissemination activities.
The Kick-off event was followed on 5-6th February by a Capacity Building workshop. Within the EPI project’s framework, partners participated in different activities by engaging and sharing their knowledge and opinion on key aspects of the EU Integration Policy. The consortium was able to increase capacities, point out challenges and suggest early potential solutions. The partners also went over the project’s next steps and the Intercultural City Reviews to be performed. In April, the questionnaire developed by the Council of Europe in the framework of the Intercultural Cities Programme was completed by all the engaged cities and in the course of May, the Asociación Ciudades Interculturales (ACI) will analyse the results and provide each city with a document including key conclusions on the assessment.
Next steps
During June, interviews and focus groups will be carried out in the participating cities in the context of the Intercultural City Reviews. The local stakeholders and technical partners will play a main role in interpreting the resulting questionnaires’ conclusions and determining priority areas to focus on. On 7-8th July 2020, the partners will meet again online to discuss the performed Intercultural City Reviews for each of the participating cities, that is to say: Cartagena, Cluj-Napoca, Dietzenbach, Linkoping, Lublin, Ravenna, and Riga. During the 2-day meeting, EPI partners will assess each city’s situation in regard to the integration of developing country nationals and share findings among the participating cities so as to define policy areas where the integration of developing country nationals is more needed and where cities’ efforts would have to concentrate to improve the situation accordingly. It will allow the project to adopt a comprehensive approach and to build city integration strategies.
© Members of the EPI Consortium
This document reflects only the authors’ view and not those of the European Community. This work may rely on data from sources external to the members of the EPI project Consortium. Members of the Consortium do not accept liability for loss or damage suffered by any third party as a result of errors or inaccuracies in such data. The information in this document is provided “as is” and no guarantee or warranty is given that the information is fit for any particular purpose. The user thereof uses the information at its sole risk and neither the European Community nor any member of the EPI Consortium is liable for any use that may be made of the information.