© Keystone / Jean-Christophe Bott
Cœur à Cœur is a joint initiative that we organise with Radiotélévision suisse (RTS) to raise funds for people living in poverty in Switzerland. It’s primarily a radio event that takes place over six days and six nights during which three television and radio personalities are enclosed non-stop in a glass studio located on Place Centrale in Lausanne.
Entertainment, concerts and many interviews with Swiss personalities will encourage you to get involved or donate by making music requests on radio station Option Musique.
At the same time, we encourage you to launch your own fundraiser to fight poverty with Cœur à Cœur. Challenges will be organised throughout French-speaking Switzerland.
In the end, the event, held from 17 to 23 December 2016, raised a total of 1,231,756 SFr.
The campaign also shed light on a little-known issue, poverty in Switzerland, for the very first time. A million people in Switzerland, or one in five Swiss residents, live under the poverty line.
Thanks to your donation, we can support people living in poverty and projects that help marginalised youth and unaccompanied minors living in Switzerland.
We help people living in poverty when they find themselves unable to pay an unexpected bill. We do this by giving them financial assistance of up to 2,600 SFr. depending on the number of family members. This help can prevent a downward spiral of poverty. Since launching this program, we have helped over 100,000 people in Switzerland. The most common requests relate to medical costs and housing.
Anyone wishing to request support may do so through their municipality’s social services or via an independent organisation.
Poverty affects young people too. In fact, they’re particularly at risk of falling into poverty. That’s why we use a portion of the money raised to fund projects aimed at young people who have interrupted their schooling or training and are unable to find their way again without assistance from a suitable programme. These socioprofessional integration projects should enable them to find their own place in society and build a life plan.
It is worth noting that these struggling young people also include migrants. In response, the funds are also used to support a few projects aimed specifically at unaccompanied minors in Switzerland, who currently number 2,736.
We started supporting young people in 2015 thanks to the Jeder Rappen zählt (Every penny counts) year-end fundraising campaign organised in collaboration with German-speaking Swiss radio and television network SRF.
Swiss Solidarity, 1211 Geneva 8
Your donation is tax deductible in Switzerland.
