Civil Society

In Denmark, over 40 municipalities provide a buddying system whereby refugees are matched with a community volunteer who provides practical guidance and support.

Together with the Philippines Overseas Employment Administration, ICMPD (under the MIEUX initiative) deployed this social marketing tool in attempting to influence the behaviour of different segments of the population (young people, students, women, would-be migrants, etc.) in relation to a campaign on trafficking and illegal recruitment. Social marketing campaigns are designed to influence the target group’s actions and adopt a new behaviour or change a current behaviour which affects the target group in a negative way.

The Crisis Communication Plan in the field of irregular migration was devised with the participation of a wide range of governmental actors and institutions at local and central levels.

Within the EU-funded ENIGMMA project, implemented by the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD), project team together with Georgian state institutions and stakeholders in the destination country started a practice of joint development of legal residence guidelines for Georgian migrants in several destination countries (Greece, Spain and Italy). On the Georgian side, the Georgian Diaspora department within MFA is involved, alongside the State Commission on Migration Issues, the Consular Department of MFA, and consular services abroad.

Social innovation initiatives have been launched in many countries to find solutions to local challenges involving migrants, refugees and host communities in social entrepreneurship ventures.

Numerous programs empower young people to identify challenges in their communities and to create entrepreneurial solutions to address these barriers. Through a combination of training, mentorship and in some cases seed funding, youth learn transferable skills to become social innovators and entrepreneurs.

Some examples of these programs (see links below) are:

The Migrant and Refugee Orientation Centre is a place both to meet and to receive support, aimed at all groups and communities that make up the multicultural society of the City of Buenos Aires. It seeks to centralize activities of State bodies and civil organizations and promote initiatives, meeting the needs and demands of migrants and refugees. Its activities are divided into 3 main areas: 1) Guidance and support; 2) Job training; and 3) Sport and recreation.

Integration is supported in Morocco within the framework the migration projects RECOMIG (‘Strengthening selected municipalities in the management of migration’) / RECOSA (Renforcement des collectivités territoriales marocaines dans l’amélioration des structures d’accueil des migrants), which on the one hand supports state structures at the national level, and on the other hand strengthens selected local actors in the creation of integration measures in the social, economic and cultural area for improvement social cohesion between migrants and the Moroccan population.

The ILO signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the International Fruit and Vegetable Alliance (AHIFORES) to carry out joint work on mainstreaming the General Principles and Operational Guidelines for Fair Recruitment in Mexico. They inded to cooperate on the certification scheme "DEAR", as well as developing a tool box to address recruitment practices in horticulture and vegetable supply chains in partnership with Verité.

Migrantour is an international project coordinated by the NGO Terra Vera, providing a new instrument for integration that promotes the cultural heritage brought by migrant citizens, asylum seekers and refugees. The project contributes to the development of a new narrative on the phenomenon of migration.

Through this project, migrants lead city tours for tourists and locals which showcase the contributions of migrants in to their home cities, and help to to share the personal stories of the guides.