Focus on Hungary: Inter Campus through the eyes of its protagonists

Hungary is a country with a growing Roma population, the majority of whom work in the fields and live in rural and ghettoised areas. Over the past ten years, the non-profit association Love is the Answer has been working in these marginalised areas on the periphery with the aim of guaranteeing the education and integration of the less privileged.

In this context, the association’s collaboration with Inter Campus has been focused on three projects.

• the project in Szendrolad, a village in the north-eastern part of the country, helps Roma children integrate into Hungarian society through football and its values. Through the work that has been done, the children have learnt the value of collaboration and teamwork. They’ve been able to take part in summer activities organised away from their ghettoised communities and meet and interact with peers from different backgrounds. Important and deep friendships have come into being thanks to the game of football.

• the most most recent project, which began last year in Debrecen in the far east of the country, aims to stem the exodus of young people from rural to more attractive urban settings. It’s this movement of people that is fuelling the economic and social crisis in the Hungarian countryside, something which we are trying to counter by making the villages great places to grow up in.

• the project in Budapest, where the youngsters at the Cepsko orphanage are part of the Inter Campus family.

There are many ways of interpreting the sport, but there’s just one shirt that unites everybody: the one belonging to Inter Campus. With Love is the Answer lending a helping hand, progress and integration are our goals.