TEHRAN – The head of the Welfare Organization, Javad Hosseini, and the deputy minister of Tajikistan's Health and Social Protection, Muhiddin Khayrullozoda, have agreed to boost cooperation in the welfare and social empowerment sectors.

During a meeting in Dushanbe on Tuesday, the officials also decided to develop a joint roadmap to expand collaborative efforts, IRIB reported. Meanwhile, the two sides highlighted cultural and historical commonalities between Iran and Tajikistan. The main axes of the meeting focused on empowering vulnerable groups of society, like people with disabilities or children who have no parents, fostering ties in education and technology fields, training Tajik social workers and psychologists, as well as sharing technical knowledge and experiences.

The officials also discussed ways to prevent disabilities, expand rehabilitation and education centers, organize nursing homes, provide services to the elderly, and prevent social harm.

Holding joint specialized conferences and signing new memoranda of understanding to implement agreements were also put on the agenda.

Welfare Organization services

During Government week (August 24-30), the Welfare Organization inaugurated different projects, namely neighborhood-based social health, physical health, and cancer screening for women heads of household, community-based rehabilitation (CBR) centers, validation of elderly day-care centers, and a talent search system for welfare recipients.

Neighborhood-based social health project focuses on revitalizing neighborhood institutions and benefiting from the capacity of qualified individuals, as well as centers under the supervision of Welfare Organization and communities to better serve the community, IRNA quoted Hosseini as saying.

The second project, physical health and cancer screening for women heads of household, is planned to be implemented in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior. The project will also be followed up on as a national program.

Concerning the fact that the country is entering a phase of population aging and a lack of professional forces, the Welfare Organization is planning to train consultants on aging or aging life care professionals. The first phase of the project will kick off during Government week, with 3,000 consultants to be trained in the private centers attributed to the organization.

The organization will also launch 200 CBR in less privileged and remote areas where access to welfare services is limited. Social workers will receive a 20-hour training to start their jobs as facilitators in these centers. They will be responsible for some 150 cases. Overseeing local communities, identifying individuals with disabilities, as well as resources and measures, are among their responsibilities.

The Welfare Organization will start to validate some 330 elderly day-care centers in cooperation with the national standard organization.

The talent search system for welfare recipients will be launched during the week, as well. It will help them to find jobs or start their own businesses. So far, 570,000 individuals have been collected, and it is estimated that during Government Week, the figure will rise to 800,000 people. For the first time, a comprehensive employment database for people with disabilities will be unveiled.

10,566 housing, employment, social, and rehabilitation projects with a total investment of 520 billion rials (some 580,000 dollars) were inaugurated on the occasion of the 45th anniversary of National Welfare Week (July 16 to 22), IRNA reported.

About 77 percent of the projects focused on employment, 21 percent on housing, and the remaining two percent on the social and rehabilitation sector, the official noted.

Moreover, 359 projects were started, most of which would be implemented in Kerman, Lorestan, and Isfahan provinces.

MT/MG