Volunteering is known as allocating time and effort in serving society and the environment, or individuals outside the immediate family. Volunteering is considered as a great way for students and professional’s and holders of academic’s degrees and highly motivated people who have talents and skills to integrate in the social work with skill development and promoting the values of tolerance and cooperation concept through concrete work.
We are a group of Syrian youth working together under the name of the “Syrian Hope Forum”. We are interested in reflecting the point of view of Syrian refugees in Lebanon, regarding volunteering in social work with United Nations agencies (UNHCR - UNICEF - WFP) and its partner organizations.
We declare the following:
We saw that there is no clear mechanism for applying for volunteering in social work. Instead, the United Nations agencies and their partner organizations rely on the recommendations of volunteers or staff to select new volunteers. This is inconsistent with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, in particular, Goal “10 - Reduce inequalities”.
Also, we noticed that some people have volunteer work with several humanitarian organizations at the same time, for many years, and this is unfair to other Syrians.
Since it has become difficult for Syrian refugees in Lebanon to obtain job opportunities due to the successive crises that have occurred in the country, and in order to limit the repercussions of the long-term refugee crisis on the Syrian youth, it was necessary to empower their capabilities by engaging in work, especially humanitarian and social work.
We hope to provide opportunities to volunteer in social work for all Syrian refugees in Lebanon within simple and uncomplicated criteria, in a fair and equal manner, away from personal recommendations. We therefore ask the United Nations agencies and its partner organizations to:
- Adopting a clear mechanism for submitting a volunteer application via the website.
- Advertise volunteer opportunities with criteria and conditions via the Internet.
- Allocating a committee to follow up on volunteering requests.
- Taking into account the financial volunteer allowance commensurate with the severe economic crisis in the country "such as: transportation fees".
Notification to:
- Ms. Najat Rochdi | UN Deputy Special Coordinator, Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator.
- Mr. Ayaki Ito | UNHCR Representative.
- Mr. Abdallah Alwardat | Country Director and Representative of WFP.
- Ms. Yukie Mokuo | UNICEF Representative
- Ms. Yeran Kejijian | UNV Country Coordinator.
- Office of “UN Resident Coordinator's - UNHCR - UNICEF - WFP - UNV” in Lebanon.
- Office of NGO in Lebanon “Mercy Corps - Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) - Danish Refugee Council (DRC) - Caritas Lebanon - Amel Association - Save the children - Kafa - Intersos”.
- Amnesty International.
- Human Rights Watch (HRW).
- Lebanese Center for Human Rights (CLDH).
- Publish to the public “Website - Social Media - Newsletter”.
