Partners: Caritas Swiss, Catholic Relief Services Bosnia and Herzegovina (CRS), Secours Catholique, Caritas Archdiocese of Vrhbosna Sarajevo, Diocese Caritas Mostar-Duvno and Trebinje-Mrkan, Diocese Caritas Banja Luka and Department for combating trafficking in human beings in the Sector for international cooperation at the Ministry of Security of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Beneficiaries: In 2009 more than 1150 direct beneficiaries of preventive activities, mostly youth and women from rural areas, refugees, Roma population, Caritas volunteers, parishes, priests, family counselors and wider public.
Project duration: 01.01.2010 - 31.12.2011
Project goals:
Project activities: media campaigns, economic empowerment, trainings, meetings, seminars, education of family counselors, work with youth, lecturers in parishes, cooperation with state organizations and NGOs.
Total value of the project: 370.696,28 KM / 189.534,00 €.
Results in 2009
Report for 2009
Caritas of the Bishops’ Conference of Bosnia and Herzegovina, together with its partners, Caritas Swiss, Catholic Relief Services Bosnia and Herzegovina (CRS), Secours Catholique, Caritas network in BH as well as with the network of local non-governmental organizations and Department for combating trafficking in human beings in the Sector for international cooperation at the Ministry of Security of Bosnia and Herzegovina, implements activities on prevention of human trafficking in BH since 2005. Results achieved so far have been significant. Cooperation between Caritas, NGOs and government institutions has been established. Communication mechanisms have been established and maintained, the counter-trafficking capacities of Caritas and other civil-society actors have been built and strengthened through counter trafficking workshops, and a number of prevention activities have been implemented in a coordinated manner reaching approximately 10.000 direct beneficiaries in particular. All project activities have been implemented within the framework established in accordance with the current Action Plan for Combating Trafficking in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The overall goal of the project was to improve abilities of vulnerable groups to avoid risks of trafficking in human beings. This project made significant strides towards achieving its goal through raising awareness of youth making them less vulnerable to human trafficking and providing opportunities for women to make safe life choices. Caritas network coordination resulted in significant progress of the project through implementation of small scale economic opportunities, wide range of public education and coordination between civil society, different faith-based organizations, government and community stakeholders. All activities contributed to improvement of livelihoods in at risk communities, raising awareness, strengthening and active utilization of coordination mechanisms among counter trafficking stakeholders. Greater involvement of the different faith-based and civil society organizations and the Department for combating trafficking in human beings in the Sector for international cooperation at the Ministry of Security of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as all previously mentioned contributed to the improvement of the existence of vulnerable groups, raising awareness, strengthening and active use of coordination mechanisms among the actors struggle against human trafficking in BH, where Caritas BK BH occupies an important place.
Economic Empowerment
In 2009 activities related to economic empowerment of potential victims of trafficking as well as workshops and lectures for youth on diocesan levels also have been successfully implemented.
In this segment of Caritas seeks to economically empower potential victims of trafficking, especially women. Women who are involved in this program are those that are in a difficult material situation, single mothers, victims of domestic violence and, as such, they are easy prey for traffickers
Diocese Caritas Mostar and Diocese Caritas Banja Luka as part of the economic empowerment identified beekeeping as a good opportunity for vulnerable families to improve their livelihoods. For this activity Caritas Archdiocese Vrhbosna (Sarajevo) organized literacy of Roma population and courses for women: knitting and crocheting course. Within this program 58 beneficiaries and 23 families with more than 110 members were economically strengthened.
Workshops for parish youth
As part of its counter trafficking efforts, Caritas continued education activities through various workshops and lectures in parishes. The content covered different topics like risk factors and consequences of trafficking, basic laws and human rights regarding trafficking, how to make informed decisions, prevention activities, and the services that are available to vulnerable individuals and victims. These workshops are an important step in efforts to raise awareness about the dangers of human trafficking among young people in BH. Three Caritas dioceses successfully conducted 17 prevention activities, workshops and lectures in 15 parishes, with more than 800 participants.
National Meeting for Youth
National meeting of youth brought together 30 volunteers who work within the project for combating trafficking in human beings as well as volunteers in the Inter-Religious Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina. During the meeting participants had the opportunity to meet with the activity of Caritas in BH, the basic notions of communication styles, communication and assertive behavior. They also discussed the topic of animation and young people for voluntary action in the fight against human trafficking; develop skills and use of non-violent communication techniques and etc. The aim of this meeting was not only to help young people from across BH to understand the impact of trafficking on family and community, but to provide them the opportunity to exchange experiences and develop new ideas for raising awareness and prevention activities in the field of combating human trafficking.
Information Campaign
Information Campaign had a preventive character with the goal to raise awareness and to reach potential victims in the same way the traffickers/smugglers reach them. The campaign featured an advertisement “10 things you should know how to prevent human trafficking”.
The campaign offered Internet users information how to avoid becoming a victim of trafficking. In this way, we wanted to warn young people and the general public of the aspect of recruitment of the victims, so that they could react if they would found themselves in a similar situation.
Inter-Religious cooperation
In the course of its counter-trafficking activities, Caritas BC BH has strengthened its relationship with the Inter-Religious Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina (IRC-BH) and theology faculties in each of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s three primary religions – Islam, Catholicism, and Serbian Orthodox. Caritas BC BH organized the training for trainers, for volunteers and members of the IRC-BH and workshops for theology faculties’ students. Afterwards, Caritas provided small grants, to the members and volunteers of IRC-BH that participated in the training for trainers, for additional training of their members and beneficiaries.
Cooperation with the Department for combating trafficking in human beings
With the adoption of the Rulebook on internal organization of Ministry of Security, Office of the State Coordinator for combating trafficking in human beings has became Department for combating trafficking in human beings in Sector for international cooperation. Cooperation between the Department for combating trafficking in human beings in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Caritas of Bishop’s conference of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Caritas network in Bosnia and Herzegovina, has existed for almost five years and it has manifested through regular meetings, information exchange, joint operations and planning. During 2009 2 meetings were held which confirmed the common commitment to the principles of cooperation according to the mutually signed Memorandum of understanding.