Do not be just dreams! – a report movie presents the social business of the Hungarian Charity Service of the Order of Malta
According to the Scripture, hungry people shall not be given fish, they shall be taught how to fish. The Hungarian Charity Service of the Order of Malta has started in the spirit of this its social business called Máltai Manúfaktúra (Maltese Manufactory), which could be strengthened and enter into the market by the support of SPAR Hungary. These manufactories offer now not only high-quality products to consumers, but also they provide a secure living to a number of disadvantaged families – this story is presented by the report movie called „Jelenlét” (Presence).
Tiszabura is known as one of the poorest settlements of the country, the Máltai Jelenlét Program (Maltese Presence Programme) is carried out from 2016 in order to help the catch-up in the village. The charity service helps the locals in every aspect of life: it runs a school, kindergarten, social service office in the settlement, and it has started job-creating businesses for three years. A carpentry and a sewing shop were established in the village, the applicants has learned a profession and gained qualification, and from 2018 they make own products e.g. canvas shopping bags for the entire SPAR store chain nationwide.
„We cannot evaluate the real effects of the pandemic yet, however, it is quite clear that food and processing industry and the retail sector will get a decisive role in the reconstruction of the economy. SPAR also participates in this, at the same time, it strives to create crisis-resistant local jobs and to involve into the value-creating work as many people as possible, both disabled or socially deprived people. It is particularly important in these times to find market-based solutions within the limits” – summarized the challenges of the pandemic Márk Maczelka, Head of Communication at SPAR
Embracing the case of women and mothers working in the sewing shop in Tiszabura meant that SPAR became a major purchaser of the manufactory. Besides this, products produced in the manufactories of the charity service in Páty and Gyulaj – jams, chutnies, sirups, pickles and teas – were put on the shelves of SPAR. In these settlements, work carried out in the local manufactory provides a secure living for the disabled and socially deprived people, which is not a simple charitable activity, but it is a self-sustaining business being functional in the sphere of competition.
„The Hungarian Charity Service of the Order of Malta aims consequently in its employment programmes that the employees produce real values. Do not buy our products because they were produced by disabled or disadvantaged people, but because they represent high quality. It should not be regret to motivate the customer, the product should sell itself” – said Tamás Romhányi, Head of Communication at the Hungarian Charity Service of the Order of Malta.
The competitive products are essential to success, just as the engagement of the charity service and the socially committed companies. However, at the end of the day, this programme is about those, who went along the road, acquired a profession, learned to carry out value-creating work and hold on in the everyday life. Part of their new life is that they produce marketable products that anyone can meet today on the shelves of stores.
The report movie called „Jelenlét” (Presence) gives an insight into their lives.
Trailer (English subtitle): https://youtu.be/lGMFgGJYQHA
Movie (English subtitle): https://youtu.be/smNkbGp6bic
Background material to the Maltese canvas bags:
Background material to the Maltese food products:
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