Two-way street in integration effort

TALLINN - The Integration and Migration Foundation Our People (MISA) of Estonia announced a project competition, the aim of which is to improve the integration process and active citizenship through media projects, reports LETA. The total amount of the project competition is 410,000 euros and the primary target group is European third-country nationals and people with undefined citizenship.

“The purpose of the competition is to support the active engagement of the target group and improve their awareness of Estonian society and culture. Various studies, including the latest integration monitoring, have shown that the social participation of non-Estonians and non-citizens is notably lower than that of ethnic Estonians. Although in recent years they have become better informed about what is happening in Estonia, it is still necessary to continue supporting the establishment of a more uniform information space,” explained Igor Ljapin, coordinator of MISA Civic Education and Migration Unit.

Ljapin added that another important point is to raise the awareness of Estonians about the life, opportunities and culture of non-citizens living in the country, because different ethnic groups living in Estonia still communicate moderately with each other.

“Compared to previous years, the conflict of interests clause has been supplemented in the competition instructions and a requirement has been added that political balance must be ensured when politicians are featured. MISA is monitoring to ensure that no repetition of the case of the unbalanced use of politicians in a project, as happened in the last competition round, will occur in future,” affirmed Ljapin.

The deadline for the submission of competition applications is June 7.
MISA has supported media projects since 2009 and invested in around forty media projects in the amount of 1.4 million euros. Support has been granted to various article series in Estonian and Russian language newspapers, television and radio programs, Internet projects and more.

With the aid provided by MISA, programs such as “Kitchen Citizens,” “Batareja,” “In live, tonight,” “Entwined souls,” “Triangle,” “Ida-Viru County News” and others have been broadcast.