News
Applicants’ opinions in the first round of the EEA/Norway NGO Fund – Questionnaire survey
Right from the start, the Hungarian NGO sector had huge expectations towards the NGO Fund – as could be seen from the great interest in the launch event in February 2013 and after.
However, the priorities and conditions of the new program are very different from those of the first NGO Fund active between 2008-2011. In order to understand better what the civil sector knows and thinks about the Fund, the Operators conducted an online survey among the 1838 registrated users (individuals and organizations) of norvegcivilalap.hu during the spring. The questionnaire was open from the 8th of May to the 15th of June, after the submission deadline but before the evaluation of the first call applications and the publication of the supported projects’ lists. The survey was scheduled like this on purpose: by this time people could learn the details the NGO Fund and the call for proposals but their opinion wasn’t influenced by the results, i.e. whether they were supported or not. (Only the first round results of the macro-projects were available at the time.)
New ideas for psychiatric care in Hungary through an internship in Norway
"Civil society professionals from Hungary are currently doing internships in Norway and Iceland with the support of the EEA Grants. The aim of the internship is to support Hungarian NGO professionals to visit and learn from the practical experience of working with an NGO in the donor states. "The internship in Norway given me a good overview of the Norwegian psychiatric system and new inspiration and ideas which I plan to implement in Hungary upon my return," says Zsofia Hetesi." You can read the whole article at ngonorway.org
What can we do against hate(speech)?
In connection with the Action Projects Call we collected a bunch of best practices in order to help our applicants. Combating hate speech and hate crime is a priority in our latest call – but this topic might sound a bit abstract. What can be done against hate? We found surprisingly many initiatives, which answer this question. The collection is available only in Hungarian but the videos speak for themselves.
Action projects
The aim of the call is to support the organization and implementation of short campaigns or one-time movements, social or/and joint actions. The actions must address one or several of the below horizontal concerns of the EEA/Norway grants:
- human rights and the rights of minorities (based on ethnic, religious, linguistic and sexual orientation), equal opportunities;
- combating racism and xenophobia, homophobia, anti-Semitism, extremism;
- tolerance, multicultural understanding and social inclusion instead of discrimination and exclusion;
- understanding, mitigation and solution of problems arising from poverty and inequalities (with special attention to the situation of Roma);
- promoting gender equality, combating inequalities, gender-based and domestic violence and trafficking.
Priority will be given to actions addressing the above mentioned concerns (one or several) through activities combating hate speech and hate crime.
Any action and campaign idea is welcome that aims to raise awareness about problems occurring in the above-described areas and takes action to solve them in order to change or improve the present situation. Preference is given to initiatives relying on diverse methods, including modern online tools or any other innovative, creative solutions which can be demonstrated to be effective.
You can be ’On the spot!’ Reporters wanted!
The Hungarian Environmental Partnership Foundation - Ökotárs Alapítvány (HEPF) in cooperation with Autonomia Foundation, Foundation for Development of Democratic Rights (DEMNET) and the Carpathian Foundation-Hungary hereby announces a call for applications in the framework of the NGO Fund of the EEA/Norwegian Financial Mechanism for Hungarian NGOs to support study trips of young people to Norway, Liechtenstein and Iceland (the donor countries).
Internships – SECOND CALL
The aim of the internship grant is to support Hungarian NGO professionals to visit and learn from the practical experience of NGOs working in the Donor States (Norway, Iceland, Lichtenstein). Interns should “import” and adapt good practices of the host countries’ NGOs in the fields of advocacy, community participation, constituency building and fundraising and also to contribute to strengthening bilateral relations between Hungary and the Donor States.
The Nordic model and civil society
Interview with Tove Skarstein, Ambassador of Norway
1. First, I’d like to ask you to summarize the main pillars of the Nordic social model. How did this model lead to the evolution of a stable and healthy society that is being referred to as an outstanding example all over Europe?
Norway, together with the other Nordic countries, has over time managed to succeed in establishing a social order where both economic growth and high levels of social equality are present. Simply put, we have found a functioning balance between a competitive market economy, based on private ownership with a relatively large state sector that provides a broad range of social services based on the principles of solidarity and universality.
Grant decision: macro projects
In the first days of August, the evaluation of the 2nd phase macro project applications was successfully completed and the final grant decision made. Accordingly, out of the 43 detailed proposals 14 received support in Thematic area I. (human rights and advocacy) and 9 in Thematic area II. (organisation and community development), with a total amount of 2.7 million €.
Taking action against hate crime and hate speech
On 22 July the Council of Europe’s No Hate Speech Movement organises a European action day to commemorate and support victims of hate crime.
Grant decision: micro projects and internship applications
The first grant decisions within the framework of the NGO Fund has been taken on 9th June 2013. Based on the recommendation of the Selection Commitees of the 7 thematic areas, the Approval Board chose to support 105 proposals, disrtibuting a total of 859,210 € out of the 1029 applications submitted by the deadline of 29th April, as below: