One of the most popular social enterprises in Bulgaria is the catering service offered by Maria’s World Foundation. The service is staffed entirely by individuals with intellectual disabilities who undergo training as cooks, servers, bartenders, and bussers. Employment in catering gives these individuals economic freedom, and regular contact with their clients secures their acceptance by the rest of society.
Until recently, Maria’s World was a novelty in the Bulgarian NGO sector. Starting this year, however, it will no longer be alone in trying to help intellectually challenged individuals overcome their limitations. The Sv. Nikolay Chudotvorets (St. Nicholas Miracle Worker) Foundation in the Northeast Bulgarian town of Dobrich, which also works to change policies related to this group, plans to set up a greenhouse for flower seedlings employing solely people with intellectual disabilities.
The initiative will be a new step in the foundation’s efforts to secure employment for the intellectually challenged. The greenhouse project will also offer landscaping services to private and public institutions in Dobrich, where there is currently a labor shortage in the sector.
The project was a winner in the 2018 edition of the NGO business plan competition held by the Bulgarian Center for Not-for-Profit Law and supported by ABF.
