Local services
On the 17th of October 2024, UNICEF and its partners in Debrecen organized a closing conference at the Family and Child Welfare Centre of the City of Debrecen to support the management of the refugee emergency in Hungary.
The project was based on the grant agreement signed on the 5th of December 2022 between the UNICEF Regional Office for the Ukrainian Refugee Programme in Hungary and the Municipality of Debrecen to support children and families who fled the Russian-Ukrainian war and their host communities. A few months after the outbreak of the war, UNICEF representatives visited the city government to learn more about Debrecen’s activities with war refugees. As a result, the outlines of a complex programme were jointly developed to enable the partners to provide a higher level of care for Ukrainian refugees and local communities residing permanently in Debrecen and Hajdú-Bihar County as refugee families with a large number of young children, child welfare and child protection services, the preservation of children’s mental health and the support of families through children played a vital role in the programme.
Debrecen signed an agreement with UNICEF, which provided concrete and substantial support for the local tasks of the municipality and several institutions and organisations in Debrecen, including the Family and Child Welfare Centre of Debrecen City, the EU-Roma National Association, the Dorkas Service, the Debrecen Institute of Primary Care and Health Promotion (Deafi) – which have been involved in the care of refugees from Ukraine and in helping local communities.
In her welcoming speech, Diána Széles, Deputy Mayor of Debrecen, expressed that this closing conference will not end a critical two-and-a-half years of cooperation but a significant milestone. The day after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war on the 24th of February 2022, many people came to Debrecen, and the city had to deal with the situation immediately. If the city’s existing care policy system – including the Debrecen Charity Board – and the authorities had not been so cooperative, Debrecen would not have been able to deal with this highly challenging situation. Then, in May, UNICEF sent an unexpected official call for cooperation and an offer of assistance, which, in compliance with the strict rules set by the international organisation, enabled the city and the organisations to use a total of more than HUF 913 million to provide refugee care, health promotion, education for refugee children and a wide range of assistance to the communities of Debrecen. This support has played a role in helping the people in need in Debrecen and in the opening and operation of the Szent Anna Street Health Promotion Centre, which now serves the health awareness of more than 11,000 people in Debrecen. Diána Széles thanked everyone who participated in this cooperation programme for the benefit of refugees from Ukraine and the people of Debrecen.
Pilar Gonzalez Rams, Head of the UNICEF Regional Office for the Ukrainian Refugee Programme in Hungary, said there are currently 60,000 Ukrainian refugees in Hungary who have gone through a lot of hardship. After the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, UNICEF launched a programme in Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland to help refugees. In dealing with the refugee situation in Debrecen, she highlighted the role of the Dorkász Service. They were the first to be contacted here and, through them, the leaders of the local government. Pilar Gonzalez Rams pointed out that the cooperation in Debrecen is one of the most fruitful partnerships of the organisation in Hungary. The people of Debrecen are very committed to helping their community, which has made UNICEF’s work much more manageable. Through partners here, they have reached many refugees and families in Debrecen through child protection, early childhood development, education, and health programmes. Pilar Gonzalez Rams stressed that UNICEF in Debrecen has also been able to build on the solid system of care already in place with their local partners and has sought to support it in such a way that they can provide care and support to refugee communities. Debrecen has used the technical information and financial support provided by UNICEF, and the cooperation has produced excellent results.
According to György Balla, a member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Debrecen’s Foundation for the University of Debrecen, UNICEF’s mission is to find and help people in need worldwide. The work that UNICEF is now supporting in Debrecen for the benefit of families must be continued and carried forward together. The University of Debrecen is also a partner, as the city and the university form a unit.
Mária Gál, Director of Nursing and Specialist Care at the University of Debrecen Clinical Centre, said that the primary aim of the cooperation between UNICEF and the city council is to improve the situation of refugees, children and women, as well as other disadvantaged groups, including in the field of holistic care. The institution was pleased to join this noble initiative and to implement the tasks linked to the supported objective. Within the framework of the Debrecen Institute of Primary Care and Health Promotion, an organisational unit of the Clinical Centre of the University of Debrecen, they provide primary health care and preventive services for these social groups, offer the possibility to participate in screening tests and carry out health promotion activities. They are grateful to the leaders of the city of Debrecen for their collaborative thinking, without which these joint achievements would not have been possible, and for their support in the continued dynamic development of the Clinical Centre. Mária Gál also thanked all the staff of the Debrecen Institute of Primary Care and Health Promotion, who are at the service of their patients with their daily sacrifices, thus contributing significantly to the recognition of the University of Debrecen and the Clinical Centre.
Following the welcome speeches, a plenary session was held by Pilar Gonzalez Rams, Head of the UNICEF Regional Office for the Ukrainian Refugee Programme in Hungary, Zsanett Harangi, Deputy Head of the Urban Development Department of the Debrecen Mayor’s Office, Head of the Family and Child Welfare Centre of the City of Debrecen Aurélia Ibolya Orosz, Head of Debrecen Institute of Primary Care and Health Promotion Csaba Papp. Ábel Lukács Kiss, Managing Director of the Dorkász Service, presented the project results in detail. Pilar Gonzalez Rams gave an overview: UNICEF assists in emergencies worldwide. This is done in several phases: first, it partners with local central government, municipalities, NGOs and religious organisations to provide immediate assistance to refugee children and families. This was the case in February 2022, during the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war in Hungary, when it contacted the local governments of Debrecen, Záhony, Budapest, Győr and various NGOs affected by the refugee crisis. The aim was to provide an integrated package of services to meet the needs of refugee families in terms of child protection, education, early development, health care, mental health, and nutrition.
For UNICEF, local governments are vital partners worldwide, but especially in the context of the Ukrainian refugee crisis, as they are the ones who provide a wide range of services at the local level; they know the local community, local opportunities and local capabilities. Thus, cooperation with the Debrecen municipality and – building on existing European programmes – with the Family and Child Welfare Centre and Daefi was a natural fit. UNICEF aims to make existing municipal care systems more inclusive so that refugees can benefit from its services and no child is left without care. This has been the focus of the Debrecen programme for the past two and a half years. In 2024, the cooperation provided thousands of people access to safe spaces and support centres, children and carers with mental health and psychosocial support, children with individual case management and children with educational support. Thousands more received essential health consultations and various health services through Daefi. Dog-assisted psychosocial therapy is one of Daefi’s flagship programmes, enthusiastically supported by UNICEF. A necessary area of the Debrecen programme has been child protection, support for mental health promotion, and particular education forms for refugees and disadvantaged people in Debrecen. For example, the School for Success programme, developed by the Dorkász Service and UNICEF, was designed to help illiterate refugee children catch up with the mainstream school system by learning to read and write.
Pilar Gonzalez Rams also mentioned that families with young children were helped with packages to provide for the children’s needs and school-age children with school kits. They also worked to develop the knowledge of parents and carers so that they could better promote their children’s development. A strong emphasis was placed on health promotion, disease prevention, hygiene and health awareness, providing children with missing vaccinations and medical consultations.
The final project meeting in Debrecen concluded with sessions on early childhood development, the mental health of refugee families and programmes to prevent bullying in schools.
Source and photo credit: debrecen.hu
