Description
The project’s starting point is the lack of answers for the professional integration of young people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, which leads to unequal access to the labour market. Aiming to help mitigate the problem, partners from different areas came together to create a sustainable alternative for professional training and inclusion of young people. The youths’ families will also be involved. A group of 36 youths from Lisbon, boys and girls, will be integrated in an agriculture higher education institution. Food produced by them will be sold in a chain of restaurants, its origin being mentioned. The project is expected to pass on the message that youths with disabilities have skills and can contribute to society through a dignified professional integration. The visibility of this social business and its financial sustainability will enable a new, more inclusive positioning in policymaking, taking into account the needs of people with disability.
Summary of project results
The direct beneficiaries of the project are young adults (18-25) with intellectual and developmental disabilities in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region. The 2001 census registered 11 315 people with mental disabilities in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley, and there was a great lack of professional integration responses (only 24% of this population is active in Portugal) or in Occupational Activities Centers (1 139 young people were in waiting lists in Lisbon and neighboring municipalities. The young adults (18-25) with intellectual and developmental disabilities in the region were the target group of the project. 30 young people between the ages of 18 and 35 and 6 between 36 and 48 got training certificates by the end of the project, awarded by the Institute for Employment and Vocational Training. In total, 26 are qualified for socio-professional integration, in addition to technological certification, meaning that they acquired personal and social skills for effective integration into the labor market. These skills were developed by a multi-disciplinary team composed of a psychomotor rehabilitation expert, a rehabilitation and social integration expert and trainers on agricultural production and gardening (including an agronomist engineer). 7 trainees have been hired immediately after the training courses but 15 more will be hired by the social business promoted by the project. The empowerment of 24 families, the work done by those experts with and in 21 companies to develop skills of these young people, awareness campaigns in society and activities with students and teachers at the university were key factors for the development of young people's skills and their consequent socio-professional integration. A social business was created: through a network of partners, the location of implementation, funding, marketing and sale of production were secured, and thus the social business was made sustainable. The project has enabled new partnerships with companies for internships with trainees and with university to ensure technical support to the agricultural unit. According to the promoter NGO, the main beneficiaries of the project regarding institutional capacity-building were the project partners (namely companies) which were not used to work with this target group and are now aware of their social responsibility in this area.
Summary of bilateral results