Children are the first to suffer when parents migrate for work, although the well-being of children is often the reason for such a change. During the last 30 months, the Terre des hommes Foundation has worked with organizations and institutions from Romania, Moldova and Ukraine to reduce the impact of this phenomenon and ensure that the rights of children and families as a whole are respected. are respected (We will use the term transnational families, iefamilies, at least one member of which migrates for the purpose of work).

The powers of parents to protect children left at home depend on the measures taken by the authorities at national or European level, so we turn to these authorities with a number of recommendations. Here are the conclusions drawn as a result of the discussions between the partners of this project and the program documents created within the framework of the action project “CASTLE – Children left behind by labor migration”.

• Children’s rights must be a priority for all parties involved in social protection, and it is vital that policies understand and support families as a whole.
• We recommend focusing attention on transnational families as active agents trying to protect their children who remain at home. We need to move away from a passive perspective where families are abandoned and children seem ‘abandoned’. The policies we recommend aim to support these families in their transnational context, recognizing the need for interconnectedness of social protection in European countries.

There video which explains in English all these needs that we consider important for the future of children.

Social protection is a joint effort (and duty) of the state, public organizations, and religious organizations. But the European Union has a great responsibility for promoting transnational policies and activities.

The four main recommendations we want to highlight are:

1. The European Union should create a transnational system of cross-border social protection. This will include institutional communication, shared databases, telephone helplines, mutual information on legislation, joint policy development teams.

2. The European Union should encourage the policy of family reunification.

3. Bilateral agreements between primary countries of origin and primary receiving countries should be signed and made public for families to be aware of.

4. The European Union should amend laws on the protection of migrant workers to facilitate relationships with family members.

Therefore, children who remain in the country of origin should be beneficiaries of these measures:

• assistance to legally working parents for children who stayed at home
• access of these children to medical services in destination countries as co-insured persons
• free temporary access to education systems in destination countries if parents decide to take their children with them
• migrants will be better informed about their rights and responsibilities in the country of destination, including the services available through government offices.

These measures should be taken quickly and effectively and should not depend on the integration of the family in the host country. We must be aware of the temporary nature of this labor migration.

In October, more than 100 people attended the international hybrid conference “Abandoned children. Best Protection Practices and Challenges for Romania, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova”, with opening remarks by Ms. Sinzia Seci, DG HOME, European Commission and Ms. Jennifer Tangney, Senior Project Manager, International Center for Migration Policy Development. and the Migration Partnership Tool. We believe that this topic is very high on the European agenda and we will strive to keep it that way, so that no child feels “left at home” or “behind”, even figuratively.

In short, the CASTLE project meant a series of solutions-oriented research to better understand the impact of migration policies and the dynamics of child protection in Moldova and Ukraine; recommendations for improving the legislative framework affecting migration in Moldova and Ukraine; better information for families and decision makers in the two countries concerned. Children who stayed at home and their families from Moldova and Ukraine were involved in all stages and contributed to the reform of the labor migration policy.

For the first time, a Research Center for the Study of Transnational Families was established at the University of Babes-Boia (Cluj) and knowledge was transformed into operational interventions so that training and awareness-raising activities were complemented by direct action.

In particular, a course for local service providers from Moldova and Ukraine, an online course for service providers from destination countries (among them Romania), an online course for transnational families, which will be provided to some recipients from Moldova and Ukraine and their family members from destination countries (Romania and other countries involved in the project).

Background: Labor migration of citizens from Eastern Europe to the European Union has increased significantly over the past 10 years, and families do not always migrate in their entirety. Many children are left with only one parent or no parents, and this is a phenomenon of transnational families. In Moldova, 21% of children have at least one parent who left, and in Ukraine, 20,000 children remained in the country with only one parent. Thus, in the absence of parents, these children become even more vulnerable and are more likely than others to experience anxiety, depression or other health problems, or to engage in antisocial behavior. In this project, Romania is both the country of destination and the country of origin of labor migrants. With almost 350,000 children left at home, this is the largest number in Europe in this category.

The action CASTLE (Children left behind by migration for work: supporting Moldovan and Ukrainian families in the EU) is co-financed by the European Union, under contract with the International Center for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) through the Migration Partnership Facility (MPF) and will take place between 15 June 2021 to December 15, 2023.

The content of this article is the sole responsibility of the partners implementing the CASTLE project and cannot under any circumstances be considered to reflect the position of the European Union and the International Center for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD).

The article is supported by the Terre des hommes foundation