Minority Rights Group 154d ago

Organisation: Association of the Civic Union of Young Roma from Romania (UCTRR) | Asociatia Uniunea Civica a Tinerilor Romi din Romania (UCTRR) The project aims to enhance the participation of Roma and non-Roma youth in decision-making processes. Building on the consensus from the Youth Rights Forum, young participants have committed to promoting youth rights as universal human rights, developing consultation mechanisms, and supporting Roma youth organizations in national and European youth networks. Key activities include providing professional training on legislative concepts, institutional functioning, and decision-making processes, as well as empowering Roma youth to better engage with public institutions and decision-makers. The goal is to improve youth participation in local policy discussions and influence decisions that benefit Roma communities. UCTRR has been supported by a grant from MRG's MARIO programme. The MARIO programme works to build a supportive environment for grassroots Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) engaged in the promotion and protection of EU values across Bulgaria, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Latvia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovenia. We select, provide financial support, and build the capacity of grassroots CSOs representing minority communities with grants. We do it for both national and transnational values. We do it to increase the resilience of grassroots CSOs. We do it to advance the protection, promotion and awareness of EU fundamental rights and values in the EU. We understand the difficulties that come with functioning as a grassroots CSO. How it can be difficult to find the funds needed to develop your activities, how the space for civic and democratic action has shrunk, and how weaponized bureaucracy, harassment and growing nationalism have made your work more difficult. In particular, we understand how this has only been exacerbated with the onset of Covid-19. We want to address these limitations: the lack of relevant funding opportunities, the lack of access to EU structures and mechanisms that protect and promote human rights, the lack of institutional support and related partnership opportunities, and the limited capacity for awareness-raising and advocacy, and how all this limits the potential of so many promising organizations. Find out more - https://minorityrights.org/mario/