The first half of the European Year of Volunteering coincides with the Hungarian presidency of the European Union. Due to these two events occurring at the same time, special attention is paid to volunteering in Hungary, both at a social and governmental level.

New and old type volunteering in Europe

In the European Year of Volunteering, the European Commission has launched a tour of the 27 member states of the European Union to promote volunteering. Each stage of the tour lasts for 7-10 days in each country, at a popular event venue. The aim is to demonstrate the diversity of the volunteering sector and to promote volunteer work. The Hungarian events of the European Tour were opened at the Millenáris Cultural Centre in Budapest on 8^th January 2011 by Viviane Reding, Vice-President of the European Commission. Here, organisations and companies presented themselves in the context of a different volunteering-related topic each day for one week. Both experts on these subjects and popular media personalities had awareness-raising discussions on debate forums.

Experts differentiated between two types of volunteering. New type volunteering is primarily directed at acquiring knowledge, spending one’s free time in a productive way and developing one’s self-awareness. Activities related to the traditional civic values, solidarity or perhaps religious background, belong to the old type.

Volunteering in Hungary

The following economic sectors employ the highest number of volunteers in Hungary: leisure and hobbies (18.5 %), sport (12%), social care (10.6 %), culture (10.4 %) and public safety protection (8.5 %). It is a thought-provoking fact that the proportion of volunteers in education is only 7.5 %, and in the relatively showy field of environmental protection barely 3.3%.

For years, the Hungarian Central Statistical Office has been recording the number of volunteers working for non-profit organisations, as well as the value of their work and their economic benefit. It is a fact to be celebrated that in recent years both the number of volunteers and the hours worked by them have increased. The proportion of adults who carry out voluntary work is estimated to be 40%. However, we must not get ahead of ourselves seeing this outstanding figure as the number of those who volunteer within some kind of organisation is only around 5%. To organise volunteers, the acquisition and application of management skills would be needed.

Examples of well-organised volunteer work in Hungary

It is a known fact that voluntary work has a beneficial effect on employment. The building of networking connections is an important factor, as well as the gaining of work experience. One proof of this fact is the ÖTLET programme, launched in 2005 with the support of the Hungarian National Employment Foundation, through which young people aged 18-30 who were looking for work were able to do long-term (10 months) volunteer work. The aim of the programme was to improve the chances of unemployed young people on the employment market by providing an opportunity to gain professional experience and to develop skills through voluntary work. From the young people’s point of view, gaining their first workplace experiences in a supportive environment where they are not required to take sole responsibility is an advantage. As part of the programme, they also received advice on looking for work. At the end of the first cycle, 70% of the participants found paid work.

The programme was later extended to include older unemployed people. For those over 45 who are permanently unemployed, voluntary work can be a safe route to get from unemployment to the world of work.

Between 2005 and 2010, the three cycles of the programme saw 585 volunteers and 403 receiving organisations take part.

The volunteer programme of the Museum of Fine Arts (Budapest) has been really successful. The idea was born in 2006 following the example of the world’s great museums. A surprising number of people have replied to the Museum’s advertisement to recruit volunteers for at least 8 hours’ work a month. Volunteers receive visitors at the information desk, they help with family and children’s programmes and they work in administrative positions as well as in the museum shop. Volunteer language teachers are teaching English to the museum guards. However, even people who work at the museum as volunteers must have training in communication and art history in order to lead guided tours.

In September 2010, the “Kezet rá – Hands On” programme was launched as a result of the Grundtvig project. Thanks to this programme, visitors get an opportunity to handle original Egyptian artefacts while volunteers give an informative presentation on Egyptian culture.

As part of the LLL programme of the European Union, Budapest’s Museum of Fine Arts and the Manchester Museum are running a joint project between 2009 and 2011 called “Involving extreme age groups as museum volunteers”. 6 volunteers in the over-50 age group from both museums took part in a 3-week exchange programme. They had the opportunity to try out working in a museum in another country. They collected ideas for the future operation of volunteering. It is fantastic that volunteering transcends national borders.