We celebrate the approval of the first State Employment Plan for the Roma population, a pioneering reference point for public policies [editar]

On 4 June, the Action Plan for Improving the Employability of the Roma Population (2025-2028) was presented, an initiative aimed at guaranteeing equal opportunities and compensating for the serious inequality in the labour market of the Roma population, whose unemployment rate is three times higher than that of the general population.

For Sara Giménez, Director General of the Fundación Secretariado Gitano: ‘Employment is key to breaking the cycle of poverty and exclusion suffered by the Roma population; for this reason we are very positive about the approval of this Plan, which is a benchmark for public policies: these are measures adapted to provide an efficient response to a particularly vulnerable social profile’.

On 4 June 2025, the Action Plan for Improving the Employability of the Roma Population (2025-2028) was presented, which aims to improve access to the labour market, training and entrepreneurship of the Roma population. To this end, it introduces verifiable objectives and allocates specific resources to achieve them. It is endowed with €304.66 million, mainly from the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+), is aimed at the 107,000 Roma people who are registered as job seekers and articulates 12 priority lines of action.

The Fundación Secretariado Gitano (FSG) is very positive about this initiative of the Ministry of Labour and Social Economy, which is in line with the current Employment Act, which recognises the Roma population as one of the ‘priority groups’ in employment policies (art. 50) and which, in line with this, develops measures that provide an appropriate response to the serious situation of inequality and discrimination affecting Roma in the field of employment.

Data on inequality

The Roma population in Spain, with an unemployment rate of 52% (rising to 60% in the case of women), is three times higher than the unemployment rate of the general population. The percentage of long-term unemployment reaches 70% and the rate of temporary employment is 73% (27% for the population as a whole). These data show the enormous inequality gap in this area, which is understandable if we consider the data on the educational level of the Roma population: only 17% of Roma people have completed secondary education; and to which we must also add the impact of discrimination in access to the labour market. All of this justifies the need to develop specific measures to compensate for this situation of structural inequality, which limits any opportunity for professional development.

In the words of the Director General of the FSG, Sara Giménez, ‘employment is key to breaking the cycle of poverty and exclusion suffered by the Roma population; for this reason we welcome the approval of this Plan, which is a benchmark for public policies: these are measures adapted to provide an efficient response to a profile of special social vulnerability’.

A pioneering Plan to address equal opportunities in employment

This Plan includes the methodology based on personalised itineraries of the main employment programme aimed at the Roma population, Acceder, which the Fundación Secretariado Gitano has been developing for 25 years with the financing of the European Social Fund through the Ministry of Labour and Social Economy, and with the co-financing of numerous public administrations throughout Spain. In the first 20 years of Acceder, 110,000 people participated in the programme, of which 33,000 got a job, reaching 91,000 employment contracts and collaborating with 15,000 companies.

Based on this experience, the FSG has supported the elaboration of this Plan since its inception and values its content positively, especially highlighting the role of training, which is fundamental for the profile of Roma people. It also values the focus on Roma youth, in particular the TándEM model, which combines training and employment, and which has already been successfully implemented by the FSG in recent years. It also considers the alliance with companies and the incorporation of the gender perspective to be key, taking into account the specific vulnerability of Roma women. The Plan can be a reference for other public policies, but also a model for other EU countries to follow.

Among the main measures included in the Plan are: Personalised insertion itineraries, with individualised accompaniment; training in alternation with employment (TándEM Programmes) aimed at young Roma people who are currently neither studying nor working; agreements with companies that include incentives for hiring; the implementation of the National Youth Guarantee System with specific actions adapted to Roma youth; comprehensive support for Roma women with training and counselling actions to promote their employability; entrepreneurship and modernisation of street vending, etc.

The Plan is completed with the development of a programme to facilitate access to public employment, an awareness-raising campaign against discrimination and anti-Gypsyism, currently in the design phase, and a study on the situation of poverty and employment of the Roma population to be developed jointly by the SEPE and the FSG.