Press Release on the International Day against Poverty

"Roma urgently need an integrative approach to break the poverty cycle"

Brussels, 16 October 2009 - On the occasion of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (tomorrow, 17 October), ERIO, the European Roma Information Office, invites the European decision-makers of all levels to take urgent measures to tackle the extreme poverty faced by the Roma minority in all EU Member States. The worst effects of the current economic crisis still have to come, especially in what concerns a rise in the unemployment rate: since the worst affected jobs are the less qualified ones, the Roma minority workers (that normally have low-skill jobs) will experiment an even higher rate of unemployment, that translates into rising degrees of exclusion and will lead to even more discrimination and segregation.

ERIO calls for an integrative approach to fight against poverty in the Roma communities. This should undertake actions in all sectors of relevance for promoting social inclusion of Roma, especially in education, labour, health and housing.

Ivan Ivanov, ERIO’s Executive Director, stated: “Roma are living in poor conditions because of the discrimination and segregation they face in all the spheres of society. It is a vicious cycle: segregation and poverty make access to education, housing, health services and employment very difficult. We have to break this cycle with a full range integration policy. We hope that the 2010 European Year against poverty and social exclusion could offer to all stakeholders in this fight the occasion to raise the awareness about this problem and to find new and more effective ways to tackle it. The outcomes of the 8th Round Table on poverty held by the Swedish presidency on 15 and 16 October can be a very useful catalyser for the policy making process. It is urgent to act now:  the more we postpone urgent measures against poverty in Europe, the more Roma communities will be affected”.

For further inquiries, please contact ERIO’s Executive Director: Ivan Ivanov, +32 473 82 38 87