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Turkey: 3RP Monthly Update - March 2015: Livelihood

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MARCH HIGHLIGHTS:

During January, February and March 2015, UNHCR Turkey was in the process of finalization of a partnership project with Refugee Education Trust (RET), which includes a component for vocational and language training, expected to become operational in April 2015. Through the implementation of the project, provision of relevant and accredited Turkish language courses to 960 Syrian adolescents and 120 Syrian adult men in Language Training Centres located in 3 districts of Şanlıurfa, as well as to 4,600 Syrian women in 46 Women’s Cultural Centres is foreseen. Activities will aim to improve integration, communication and increase the livelihood opportunities of all participants, and all the teachers recruited for the project will receive specialized and accredited training.

UNHCR has worked closely with the national authorities in the course of drafting of the TP Regulation which incorporates an article on access to labor market by Syrian refugees granted Temporary Protection. The article is instrumental in ensuring access to employment and self-reliance by Syrian refugees affected by the humanitarian crisis entering in its fifth year. The draft regulation determining the principles and procedures for integration of Syrians in the national labor market was submitted to the Council of Ministers and it is anticipated that it will be issued after the elections.

ILO is planning to engage an intervention with 3 basic components; contributing national and local capacity development to deal with refugee crisis in Turkey, improving the knowledge base on the crisis and its implications on the labour market and strengthened local economic development through demonstrative projects. The preparatory work is in progress and it is expected to start up the referred interventions by May 1, 2015.

UNDP is currently working on a project aiming to support the occupational skills and access to labour market for Syrians under temporary protection, with the EU in Gaziantep, in industrial and service sectors.

In Mersin province, IOM continued its support Syria social gathering activities through their community center to support Syrian refugees access vocational training, 1,685 beneficiaries received language training (Arabic, English and Turkish) along with other subjects to rebuild the vocational capacity of the Syrian refugees in the region.

The program designed by UNIDO in partnership with IHKIB and AFAD to equip the refugees with vocational skills for the garment sector is approved. Due to lack of resources and the magnitude of the problem this aspect requires attention and is not always perceived as priority.

Furthermore, the situation is much more critical for women, taking into consideration the usual gender related problems that are aggravated because of their refugee status and lack of income. The implementation will start as of April in the provinces of Gaziantep, Kahramanmaraş and Şanlıurfa.
UNDP conducted a skills mapping exercise to assess the occupational skills of the Syrians under temporary protection in Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa.

The target groups of the field survey are (i) Syrians under temporary protection off-camps and (ii) related NGOs, public institutions, businessmen associations and chambers in Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa.

The survey composed of (ii) face-to-face interviews of a total of 4000 respondents (1992 Males and 2008 Females) from 1000 households and (ii) 24 in-depth interviews with the target groups (6 in Şanlıurfa and 6 in Gaziantep)

The exercise has been finalized and reached up to 4000 individuals both in Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa Provinces. The exercise is focusing on industrial and service sector and results of the exercise will feed into the pipeline projects which aims at enhancing vocational and occupational skills of the Syrians under temporary protection and their integration into the local labor markets. . The results of the survey have been collated and both qualitative and quantitative detailed analyses will be compiled in a report soon.