A representative of the country’s community of volunteers, Tatiana Mironyuk, during a briefing evaluated the current state of the volunteering movement in Kazakhstan, reports Qazmonitor citing the Central Communication Service.
Mironyuk is the manager of the Republican Volunteer Front-Office “Birgemiz” and executive director of ALE "National Volunteer Network".
The Republican Front-Office, created in 2020, handles not only statistics, but also financial, informational, and training support for volunteers. In 2022, the government passed its first law on volunteering, which specified the standard of state support for the development of volunteering.
Mironyuk noted that volunteering activities differ in each region and are influenced by economic and climatic conditions. As an example, she referenced Mangistau, known for its environmental projects, and West Kazakhstan, where the main emphasis is on healthcare.
Overall, the main feature of volunteering in Kazakhstan is that over 80% of volunteering initiatives aren’t officially registered.
Our volunteering’s said to love silence. But we are fighting this myth. We say that volunteering should be declared bravely, brightly, and proudly, so that everyone hears about it. Then there will be a great impetus for the development of such initiatives.
According to Mironyuk, there has been a decline in volunteering activities since 2020, which was labeled as the Year of Volunteers. The statistics show that, compared to 2020, which had over 200,000 volunteers, there were 160,000 volunteers registered in 2021.
It is natural that after the pandemic volunteers went about their business, returned to their jobs, or wanted to focus on their personal lives. But there’s another thing - there were volunteers that switched to more professional volunteering. In the first half of 2022, that number was 30%.