International Roma Day: Celebrating Roma Culture and Addressing Challenges in Ukraine

On April 8, the world celebrates the International Roma Day, a holiday that aims to draw attention to the culture, history and problems of the Roma people.

Therefore, we decided to dedicate the live broadcast of Intent.Insight to the traditions, challenges and future of the Roma in Ukraine.

For many years, Roma have been one of the largest ethnic groups in the Odesa region, but there are still many stereotypes and prejudices around them. Valeriy Bolgan, editor-in-chief of Intent, spoke to Yulia Gladka, the communications manager of the Charitable Foundation "Winds of Change", coordinator of the women's leadership development, and Tetiana Farima, coordinator of the Roma development of the Charitable Foundation "Winds of Change".

According to the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, the last All-Ukrainian census indicated that 47,587 Roma lived in Ukraine. It should be noted that the last full-fledged census took place in 2001. In January 2020, an estimate of the country's population was also made, but it did not include the population of Crimea and the Joint Forces Operation area.

According to NGOs, by 2022, the number of Roma in Ukraine will have increased to 200-400 thousand. The largest communities are in Zakarpattia, Odesa, Donetsk, Kharkiv, and Dnipro regions.

Every week, Intent.Insight looks at one issue that worries Ukrainians and raises topical questions and tries to solve specific problems. For example, on April 1, Valeriy Bolgan talked to Ivan Stulnyk, logistician of the emergency response department of the NGO "Tenth of April", about the problems of internally displaced persons.

The previous live broadcast on March 25 was devoted to vocational training in Odesa Oblast, and on March 18 they discussed Odesa's transportation problems and the launch of the MISTO digital platform.

Кирило Бойко