Video
Learn more about our programs, partners and activities in our video gallery.
In this place, we will have our people, our partners to come together and work, and create new ideas, create new ventures and make sure that we can enlarge the net."
Simone Bemporad, board member of The Human Safety Net and Generali Communications and Public Affairs Director, guides us in a preview of the auditorium and the exhibit inside the Procuratie Vecchie in Venice, the future home of The Human Safety Net.
Carlos is a social entrepreneur originally from Colombia and created Populaire Café with a couple of friends to promote, fairly traded, farmers coffee from his country of origin. He got support from La Ruche, The Human Safety Net Refugee Start-Up partner in France to improve its social business model, and realized they need to invest more in marketing. When the pandemic hit 90% of their business base made of restaurants and cafès, they started to find new sources of income to survive during lockdown. Now they deliver their fair trade coffee all around Paris by bike, helping other refugees along the way.
Specialised workers, building engineers, project architects, art restorers, ancient knowledge, modern tools, human passion: discover the progress of a respectful restoration inside the Procuratie Vecchie in St. Marks Square in Venice.
At the end of 2021 this will become our home, a place open to everyone willing to positively impact on the lives of people living in vulnerable contexts worldwide.
#buildingthehome #THSNInAction
When lockdown hit Paris, both Carlos and Sina had to reinvent their work: as a social entrepreneur, Carlos and his colleagues needed to find new sources of income while Sina, who is in charge of the incubator for refugee entrepreneurs in Montreuil worked out how to keep supporting their 26 start-ups even if the incubator was closed.
Listen to their voice or read the full interview here.
When lockdown started Noémie and her team needed to “invent” new ways to maintain the relationship with the families they help at the family center. They managed to do this creating a What’s App group, ensuring families are regularly contacted and keeping on with the routine as much as possible, including celebrating birthdays.
Have a look at the full interview with Noemie, in charge of the Maison de Familles in Vaulx-en-Valin, one of The Human Safety Net Families partners in France.
Despair, and a deep loneliness that was already there before 14th of March is now much greater, and much more difficult to bear for the vulnerable families.
This is what Felipe, who leads THSN partner ITACA activities in the outskirts of Barcelona, says about the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In cities that were built to be consumed and not to be lived, what these families and their children need most is information, help to cover their basic needs but also psychological and educational support.
Even in the post-lock-down period, the needs of the vulnerable families are the same, but their situation is getting worse day after day. That's why Laurent, who leads Intermèdes Robinson activities in the southern Parisian region, says: 'We could not stop our activities. On the contrary, we had to multiply them. We focus on the essential needs: food, basic hygiene materials, and products for babies.'
Because they are used to fight against bad circumstances, entrepreneurs with a refugee background have an ability and the mindset to overcome the most adverse circumstances. Olaf, head of the Social Impact Lab in Munich and THSN partner for Refugee Start-Ups in Germany is optimistic. He thinks that it might take more time for refugee entrepreneurs to understand if their business works, but they will make it also through this challenge.
We talked to Stefanie, Project Manager at FITT gGmbh in Germany, who explained how COVID-19 outbreak had impacted their work. To continue supporting refugees to create their own business, FITT rapidly reorganized its activities online and provided help to all entrepreneurs. With the hope of being able to laugh together soon. Watch the video to learn more.
You should let everyone appreciate it without altering it". Giving new life to a work of art requires a team effort, skills, and passion. Meet the team engaged in the restoration of Procuratie Vecchie, the centuries-old building in Piazza San Marco in Venice that will become our home, within a renovation project directed by David Chipperfield Architects
