São Paulo – The State of São Paulo will provide training to state and municipal public servants working with refugees. The training will also be offered to professionals at institutions, organizations and committees involved with refugees. The goal is to spread knowledge on immigration in Brazil, map out the biggest challenges faced by refugees, standardize government services and fight prejudice and xenophobia, according to press material.
The initiative is held by the São Paulo State Secretariat for Social Development, via the School for Social Development of the State of São Paulo, in partnership with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The training cycle is called “Migração e Refúgio” (Migration and Asylum) will target workers in the 645 municipalities of the state of São Paulo, which gets the most asylum applications in Brazil. Lectures will be streamed online from 8:30am to 1pm.
The joint secretary of State and Social Development of São Paulo, Felipe Sigollo, and UNHCR’s spokesperson in Brazil, Luiz Fernando Godinho, will open the event. The first topic will be “Categorias Migratórias no Brasil” (Migratory Categories in Brazil), with the speakers Adriana Capuano and José Blanes Sala, from Universidade Federal do ABC. An overview of asylum in Brazil and the world will be given by Vinícius Feitosa, UNHCR Brazil’s assistant for protection, and Larissa Leite, of the Archdiocesan Caritas in São Paulo. The Syrian refugee Dana Al-Balkhi will participate.
“This is a way of strengthening our safety net and improving our welcome, pooling together national, state and municipal service frameworks,” said the state secretary for Social Development Floriano Pesaro. UNHCR data shows that 20 million people have left their countries to seek asylum. Numbers from Brazil’s National Committee for Refugees (Conare) show that 8,400 foreigners have been granted legal refugee status in Brazil. Most of them are Syrian, at 20%, and most requests are made to the state of São Paulo – 41%.
The lectures will not be open to the public, but will be available online from the Rede do Saber website (see link below).
Migration and Asylum training cycle
Wednesday, February 17, 2016
From 8:30am to 1pm
Online streaming
http://www.rededosaber.sp.gov.br/portais/
Email: [email protected]
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
