Participants: 10 people (4 people from Szeged vocational school, 6 people from SZIA staff)
The Symbiosis Foundation is one of the best-known social enterprises in the Northern Hungary region. Since 1999 the Foundation has established a complex service model. It is one of the most intensively developing, most innovative non-governmental organizations in Hungary in the field of care and employment of people with disabilities. In the institutions maintained by the Foundation, in addition to developmental employment, the possibility of accredited and employment at the open market is also provided. The activities of the foundation are extremely diverse, so that people with disabilities and workers with disabilities can find work that matches their abilities. The foundation is able to offer a wide range of job opportunities to new applicants in the field of production, contract work and service. We considered the forms of employment for people with disabilities and health impairments, where the emphasis is on the remaining abilities and skills. The organization enables people with disabilities to work in the long term, build careers, and participate in various training sessions. The organization helps the further development of the employees and the completion of the vocational rehabilitation with a professional labor market service.
László Jakubinyi, head of the foundation, and Aliz Tóth, a foundation employee, guided the participants at the locations of employers. We had the opportunity to meet with workers with disabilitiesand workshop leaders, with whom we exchanged opinions on support for work integration, performing work, providing appropriate working conditions, and means of support for staying at work.
Places for rehabilitation employment we have visited:
Miskolc, Baráthegyalja u. 156. and Majorság u. 1.,
– ceramic workshop
– livestock farm (care of farm animals: poultry, goats, horses, donkeys, pigs)
– Baráthegy Board House and Adventure Park
– Ecotourism services
– Goat cheese-making workshop
Miskolc Ibolya utca 41. and Kisfaludy Károly u. 46.
– Jam-making manufactory
– Baráthegy kitchen
– carpentry workshop
– gardening.
In Baráthegyi Majorság, livestock farming is carried out by Baráthegyi Majorság Nonprofit Kft., an independent agricultural company owned by the Symbiosis Foundation, in accordance with legal regulations. The freshly produced goat’s milk goes to the new cheese manufactory built two years ago, where various goat’s cheese products are made with the most modern equipment and based on a unique recipe based on local traditions: natural and various flavored lumps of cheese, soft and semi-hard cheeses, cream cheeses and yoghurts.
The carpentry workshop is one of the oldest businesses in the company. The carpentry workshop in the classical sense was supplemented with mulch production and production of heating raw materials (pellets).
Baráthegy kitchen has been operating stably and profitably for years, most of its customers are social institutions or elderly, needy people using social catering services. The nature of the activity is diverse, ranging from participation in kitchen operations (preparation of cooking ingredients, cleaning, washing, cutting, packaging, washing dishes, tidying up) to assisting in the delivery of food.
Ecotourism services On the farm windmill draws water from the well, next to the garden pond, foil tent, greenhouse there is a barn (goat, donkey, horse, pig, alpaca) and various manufactories (cheese kitchen, bread oven, carpentry and craft workshops) where people with disabilities and altered working abilities are working. The tourism activity of the farm are two interdependent forms of work for people with disabilities: – park maintenance activities on 5 acres, – reception of groups as a tourist service, provision of catering and animation activities.
The Jam Cooking Manufactory also employs young people with disabilities and altered working abilities, where they produce vegetable creams and jams according to the season. In all work stages – starting with the procurement of vegetables and fruits, the commissioning of the jam cooker, processing until the final preparation of the product; packaging, labeling – until the end of the work process they can take their share. Interestingly, baked teas are produced here, a product with which they are almost unique in the market. The products are sold at local producer fairs and in many shops. People with disabilities can also be involved in sales at fairs.
Baráthegy Board Houseand Adventure Park is a family-friendly pension, which also has a wellness department, where it is planned to employ 27 people, of which: 13 people with altered working ability and 14 disadvantaged people.
The activities of the foundation are of model value, as they address a very important social problem and create job opportunities for disabled workers with significant disadvantages in the labor market.