The FEAD aims to improve the living conditions of persons at risk of poverty and social exclusion. Thus, the FEAD makes an important contribution to the Europe 2020 strategy which aims at clearly reducing the number of affected persons by 2020 and it makes a contribution to the European Pillar of Social Rights, which is to grant citizens new and more effective rights.
The FEAD attaches particular importance to the equal treatment of men and women and the prevention of all forms of discrimination.
The fund was initially established for the 2014-2020 funding period and will be implemented in Germany in two funding rounds. It was officially launched in Germany on 22 February 2016 at a kick-off meeting in Berlin.
Who can get FEAD support?
The FEAD supports projects in Germany for people who are affected by poverty and have no or only insufficient access to the local or regional assistance services. The target group includes
- particularly disadvantaged newly arrived union citizens including parents with their children of pre-school age (up to 7 years)
- homeless people and people at risk of homelessness
The FEAD is an important instrument to help municipalities to face up to the challenges resulting from the increasing immigration of Union citizens from other EU states. The FEAD thus helps to implement the coalition agreement concluded by the CDU/CSU (Christian-Democratic Union/Christian Social Union) and the SPD (Social Democratic Party).
A small share of the newly arrived Union citizens and the newly arrived children of Union citizens suffers from particularly harsh personal circumstances. In their countries of origin, their lives were dominated by poverty and social exclusion. And also in Germany, social integration is hard to achieve. Many of them have poor language skills, no or a low level of school education or vocational training, they suffer from health problems or problematic housing conditions. As they have experienced exclusion, they often do not feel in a position to seek or accept help.
In the first two funding rounds (2014-2020), the goal of supporting newly arrived parents and their children (up to 7 years of age) was implemented by the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs in cooperation with the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth.
Another target group are homeless people and people at risk of homelessness to whom the Federal Government's Report on Poverty and Wealth refers in particular. They have been affected by the problem of no or insufficient access to the support systems available locally or regionally for quite some time, which is above all due to the fact that in addition to their housing situation they are also burdened by other problems.
How does the FEAD help? What activities are eligible for support?
The FEAD fulfils a bridging function between the target groups and existing support systems. Funding is granted for additional staff, especially for outreach work counsellors and in local counselling centres. Their task is to help the persons affected to get access to existing programmes, e.g. to language courses or medical counselling and assist them in making use of them as sustainably as possible. Children of EU immigrants shall be brought into early education and social care services such as child day-care facilities or other pre-school or leisure-time programmes.
Cooperation between municipalities, non-governmental welfare institutions and other non-profits is obligatory for project management organisations. This makes the projects more transparent and efficient.
Purely material benefits cannot be funded by the FEAD.
Financial framework conditions
The FEAD in Germany has a total financial volume of up to 108 million euros. 151 projects were funded nationwide in two funding rounds. The initial total volume of 93 million euros, including EU funding of 85%, federal funds of 10% and own funds of 5%, was increased by federal funds of up to 15 million euros by the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs to extend 45 projects of the second funding round from January 2021 to no later than the end of June 2022.