October the 21st, SKY members met with the Maailma.net to discuss migrants’ participation in media, public debate, migration and/or sustainable development issues.
The subject to which we draw attention is sustainable development and the position of the immigrants. Several topics of discussion and conclusion were:
- Immigrants are willing and have sufficient capability to participate.
- Prejudices about immigrants are still actual.
- To introduce local people and immigrants by using artistic works (theater, dance, music..etc)
- Using the racist and sexist words is still very common and one out of every four Fins sees it acceptable in public debates.
- The new immigrants’ profile is different than the previous ones. They have specialized in a specific business but versatile. Also, they are interested in art or social and voluntary organizations.
- Finland could utilize a qualified workforce by developing appropriate policies to create a safe path into business as soon as possible.
As a SKY, we declared our readiness for cooperation in many aspects, especially integration and emphasized a few more issues that:
- Diversity brings new opportunities in the workplace, so to hire people with a migration background is not a challenge.
- More immigrants work for safety in many EU countries than those who make trouble. This is not talked about a lot.
- Making more of cultural interaction points between immigrant and local, so that differences and similarities are learned and celebrated festively.
- Many immigrants can play a crucial role in society when responsibility is given. So, more encouragement and responsibility for immigrants needed.
- Facilitating the activism and couching of the successful immigrants to advocate for other immigrants, such as training, consulting and advocacy.
- Message for immigrants that they have to also think and work hard, finding a niche, and take responsibility to make this society a better place for all of us.