Publications
The Health Status of Romani Women in Bulgaria
The idea for the present report appeared to feel a gap existing regarding Romani women situation in Bulgaria. Only few peaces of data are available regarding Romani women situation. They are even fewer concerning Romani women health situation. At the same time dynamic changes in the health system in Bulgaria in the recent years affected mostly Roma. This necessitates a study “mapping” the situation. The present research does not pretend to be an exhaustive study but it sets a frame that should be additionally filled up in the future. The authors will be happy if the present research provokes other research teams to continue and extend this work.
The research aimed at revealing the heath status, problems and needs of Romani women in Bulgaria with respect to factors such as type of settlement, Romani subgroup they belong to, age and marital status which would create a clearer picture. A tailored approach has been extremely important because the specifics of the different sub-groups within the Roma community, for example, define different problems. Moreover, the different Roma groups due to the difference in the intensity of their contacts with the macro-society are at a different level of modernization which also influences their attitudes towards various issues. At the same time, a number of factors have an impact on forming the perceptions and concepts of the members of a community: religion, type of settlement, type of family, educational level, socio-economic status, and so on. This could result in diversity even within a single Roma community and in contrary situation in two neighboring settlements.
Annual report “Roma Integration in Bulgaria – 2006”
Annual report “Roma Integration in Bulgaria – 2006” prepared by Center “Amalipe” was recently published. It concerns the main trends in Roma integration process from January to December 2006 with accents on education, social policy, living conitions, connecting EU accession with Roma integration and gender equality. Special attention is paid to institutional an normative framework for Roma integration at national, regional and local levels.
Deyan Kolev, George Bogdanov, Maria Metodieva, Teodora Krumova and Boyan Zahariev are the repor authors. The report combines results from permanent monitoring of the daily activities of certain national institutions with results of field survey about the state of Roma integration in 17 municipalities all over Bulgaria realized by Center “Amalipe” and 8 other Roma NGOs.
