PREVENTIVE SOLIDARITY MODEL AGAINST POVERTY: PSYCHOSOCIAL SUPPORT AND REGULAR FOLLOW-UP
The Deep Poverty Network tracks the needs of registered households through a digital database and provides both regular and periodic support. We assess household income, the number of children, health conditions, and barriers to accessing fundamental rights, taking the multidimensional poverty index into account. We also follow households regularly through home visits and phone calls.
Basic-Needs Support
We provide digital gift cards valid at selected supermarkets to support households’ access to food. Through these digital cards, we help meet children’s nutritional needs, infants’ formula and diaper needs, and households’ general food needs. Households headed by a single parent, as well as households with a family member with a disability or a child with special needs, receive digital cards in different amounts depending on their circumstances.
We also provide digital gift cards valid at selected stores for clothing for children and adults living in deep poverty. The amount of this support varies depending on periods such as holidays, the beginning of the school year, and seasonal transitions.
Utility-Bill Support
In cooperation with ODI-BiKomşu, the Deep Poverty Network implements the Bill Solidarity project. Through this solidarity model, unpaid water, phone, internet, electricity, and natural gas bills are covered for families relying on casual and precarious work — including waste pickers, construction workers, domestic workers, textile workers, and others — who struggle to meet multiple basic needs.
Education Support
To prevent children from becoming disconnected from education, we provide support such as school supplies, scholarships, special education, nutrition, books, toys, and study desks. Children at risk of disengaging from education are monitored separately through fieldwork, and families are offered psychological guidance, referrals, and mentoring support in relation to peer bullying.
Psychological Support
With the support of psychologists and supervisors, we provide households living in deep poverty with psychological counseling and referrals to social support services, particularly to strengthen parenting skills. Specialist referrals are made especially for the psychosocial needs of children, women, and individuals experiencing crisis.
In-Kind Donations
Hygiene packages, school supplies, furniture, household appliances, children’s products, medication, and various household items are provided as in-kind support to households based on identified needs. Donations are collected by the field team and distributed according to households’ priority needs.
Referrals to Public Institutions
The Deep Poverty Network refers households to social assistance and solidarity foundations, municipalities, social service centers, and other public institutions. We provide guidance on access to rights-based support and assist with applications for rent, health care, education, and social assistance. Households are informed about available support models; application documents are followed up, and subsequent stages of the process are monitored.
2026
BARRIERS OF POVERTY: A MULTIDIMENSIONAL INTERVENTION MODEL FOR HOUSEHOLDS WITH CHILDREN WITH SPECIAL NEEDS AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES
In Türkiye, deep poverty has in recent years become a structural and multidimensional form of inequality, particularly affecting children and people with special needs. There is a direct link between special needs, disability, and poverty. Poverty can increase the risk of disability through inadequate nutrition, unhealthy housing conditions, lack of access to health services, and delays in early diagnosis.
Field observations by the Deep Poverty Network show that poverty in these households is not only a lack of income but a multilayered form of deprivation affecting health, education, housing, transportation, and participation in social life. Households often rely on casual and precarious work; in some cases, however, family members are unable to participate in the labor market because of caregiving responsibilities for children or family members with disabilities. This increases the care burden on women in particular and further reduces household income. Families are forced to choose between basic needs and expenses related to health, special education, and care, with negative consequences for children’s development.
Within the project, a biopsychosocial support model is being implemented for a total of 42 individuals in 35 households living with children with special needs, people with disabilities, or people with chronic illnesses. The model includes monthly cash assistance, food support, essential household items, and support for medical needs. Referral mechanisms and cooperation with organizations such as the Turkish Thoracic Society, Istanbul Medical Chamber, Psychiatric Association of Türkiye, and Human Health and Education Foundation are also used to strengthen access to health and special education services.
The project does not aim only to meet short-term needs. It also seeks to develop a holistic intervention model that strengthens households’ access to health, education, and social services. Through this model, we aim to support children’s right to development, reduce the burden on caregivers, and develop social policy recommendations that can help reduce the intergenerational transmission of poverty. A report based on the field data will be presented to public institutions in order to contribute to the development of rights-based social policies.
A BOX OF HOLIDAY JOY PROJECT
According to 2024 data from the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK), 9.2% of households with children aged 15 or younger are unable to provide new clothes for their children due to financial constraints, while 9.4% of children under 15 do not have two pairs of properly fitting shoes for the same reason. In other words, many families cannot buy new clothing for their children when it is needed, and these rates are even higher among low-income households.
In the Deep Poverty Network’s 2025 report on clothing insecurity, which examined 234 children living in 90 households supported by the Network, 129 children did not have enough underwear because of financial constraints; 158 reported unmet needs for trousers, 148 for T-shirts, and 192 for sneakers or other shoes.
The project supports households that rely on precarious forms of work — including textile work, casual domestic work, street vending, collecting paper and other recyclable materials, or selling flowers — as well as households headed by single mothers who depend on social assistance and care for an infant or a child with a disability at home. The project is designed for 61 children in 20 single-mother households that the Deep Poverty Network has been working with over the long term and that live in conditions of deep, multidimensional poverty.
We provide clothing support three or four times a year through digital gift cards for children who cannot access essential clothing such as clothes, shoes, underwear, and coats, particularly around holidays, seasonal transitions, and the beginning of the school year. Under this project, we provide one-time clothing support to 61 children in 20 households during a seasonal transition period. Access to clothing is a basic right. Appropriate clothing supports children’s school attendance, helps reduce the risk of peer bullying, protects them from illness in cold weather, and reduces infection risks by ensuring access to clean underwear. For these reasons, the project seeks to ensure children’s access to clothing as a fundamental right.
2025
MULTIDIMENSIONAL POVERTY PROGRAMS
SINGLE MOTHERS’ EMPOWERMENT PROGRAM
This project was developed to make visible the multilayered poverty experienced by single mothers and to open up discussion around the public support mechanisms they need. Single mothers face profound economic and social difficulties. Their burden becomes even heavier because they must provide for the household while carrying sole responsibility for the care of their children. This dual responsibility is especially severe and often unsustainable for women with young children or women who are responsible for caring for elderly relatives, children with disabilities, or other family members in the household.
When care responsibilities and the risk of social exclusion prevent them from participating in the labor market, the cycle of poverty within the household deepens. When they have to leave their children or dependent relatives with family members or neighbors in order to work, both safety risks and psychological difficulties increase. Caught between care and earning a living, these women often work in precarious, low-paid jobs and face serious barriers to accessing fundamental rights such as housing, food, health care, and education.
The project targets 20 single mothers living in deep poverty in Istanbul and implements a holistic intervention model focusing on the intersection of gender inequality and multidimensional poverty. In addition to regular cash assistance, individualized social support packages include psychological support, legal counseling, childcare support, vocational guidance, and access to health services.
Tracked through a comprehensive monitoring and evaluation system, the project’s ultimate aim is not only to strengthen mothers and help break the cycle of poverty, but also to use concrete data from this pilot to develop and advocate for a rights-based, gender-responsive social policy model.
AGAINST POVERTY PASSED ON TO CHILDREN: PSYCHOSOCIAL SUPPORT PROGRAM FOR EDUCATION
Factors such as a lack of social stimulation, the absence of suitable spaces and materials for studying at home, and poor well-being can prevent children from continuing their education. During the 2025–2026 school year, this model is being implemented for children aged 3–15 in families that the Deep Poverty Network has worked with for many years, particularly those at risk of starting their education at a disadvantage or struggling to remain in education.
Within the “on-site” and “one-to-one” psychosocial support programs for parents and children, support includes in-kind school materials, nutrition, clothing, books, toys, internet access and tablets for online education, psychological support, social activities, mentoring, and assistance with the household’s basic needs.
The program directly supports and regularly follows up with 80 school-age children in 37 households, while also keeping track of their siblings in the same households. In total, the program supports the education of 112 children. We also carry out advocacy to promote the model among civil society organizations and public institutions as a replicable example based on its demonstrated impact.
2024
INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE OF EXPERIENCE IN COMBATING DEEP POVERTY
In the third year of our strategic partnership with the Türkiye Representation of Heinrich Böll Stiftung Association, we implemented the International Exchange of Experience in Combating Deep Poverty Project.
As part of the project, we carried out study visits to Warsaw, Berlin, and Brussels in May 2024 to examine policies and practices developed in different countries to combat poverty and to strengthen the exchange of knowledge and experience between institutions. The meetings focused on access to food, school meal programs, early childhood services, homelessness, social services, and the direct participation of people with lived experience of poverty in decision-making processes.
Warsaw
During our meetings in Warsaw, we discussed preventing food waste, children’s access to food, school meal programs, the role of local governments, and work with communities exposed to discrimination. With the Federation of Polish Food Banks, we reviewed supermarket donations, products collected from local markets, EU-supported programs, and legal regulations concerning food donations. With the International Cooperation Department of the Mazovia Region, we discussed the roles of local governments and civil society in school meal programs, as well as practices such as children’s food preferences, workshops, and dietitians’ communication with families. We also exchanged knowledge with Izabelin Municipality, Polska Akcja Humanitarna, the Child Development Foundation, and the Towards Dialogue Foundation on social support services, early childhood initiatives, school-based programs, and community-based advocacy.
Berlin
In Berlin, we visited organizations working on access to food, homelessness, and bureaucratic barriers to social services. With Berliner Tafel e.V., we examined its system for collecting and distributing donated food and its model of inter-institutional cooperation. With KLIK e.V., we discussed the barriers faced by people experiencing homelessness in accessing basic rights and social services, as well as the counseling services available to them.
Brussels
In Brussels, the meetings focused on the direct participation of people with lived experience of poverty in decision-making. With the Flemish Network Against Poverty, we examined participatory approaches to sharing experience and the “experts by experience” model. With Le Forum, we discussed methods that enable people to tell their own stories directly and work on youth homelessness. With HIVA – KU Leuven, we explored the contribution of academic knowledge to social policy.
Third Conference on Combating Poverty
We brought the knowledge and experience gained through our international study visits to the Third Conference on Combating Poverty, held on 17 October 2024 at the Istanbul Planning Agency’s Florya Campus.
Held with international participation for the first time, the conference was titled “The Agency of People Experiencing Poverty: New Approaches and Strategies.” Discussions focused on recognizing people living in poverty not merely as target groups of social policy and support services, but as active subjects who contribute to efforts to combat poverty through their own knowledge and experience.
Civil society representatives, researchers, and practitioners from Türkiye and other countries shared approaches developed around experts by experience, participatory methods, access to food, homelessness, and rights-based social policies. In January 2025, we published the abstracts of the work presented at the conference in the Third Conference on Combating Poverty Book of Abstracts.
Through the project, we aimed to transfer international experience into anti-poverty work in Türkiye, strengthen inter-institutional cooperation, and expand approaches based on the direct participation of people with lived experience of poverty in knowledge production and decision-making.
EMPOWERING POOR AND VULNERABLE PEOPLE EXPOSED TO DISCRIMINATION PROJECT
We implemented the Empowering Poor and Vulnerable People Exposed to Discrimination Project to help people living in deep poverty and facing discrimination defend their rights more effectively, improve their access to legal support and counseling mechanisms, and strengthen local cooperation against discrimination.
The project began in October 2023 and was completed in autumn 2024. It was implemented in partnership with the Equal Rights Monitoring Association, Equality Monitoring Center, Netherlands Helsinki Committee, and the Deep Poverty Sub-Group of the Istanbul Bar Association Human Rights Center. The project was supported under the Together Against Discrimination Project, financed by the Delegation of the European Union to Türkiye.
As part of the project, we organized six awareness workshops in Şişli and Çekmeköy, facilitated by volunteer lawyers. A total of 51 people participated. The workshops addressed discrimination and rights violations encountered in everyday life through case examples and possible remedies. We shared information on basic legal concepts, relevant legislation, public institutions to which applications can be made, legal aid centers, and free legal support mechanisms.
To assess the impact of the workshops on participants’ knowledge and awareness of discrimination, we conducted surveys before and after the sessions. We also collected data on the forms of discrimination experienced by people living in deep poverty across different areas of daily life and the difficulties they face when seeking remedies.
Publications Prepared Within the Project
The “Anti-Discrimination Law 101 and Communication Guide” was prepared to support civil society organizations in participating more effectively in legal processes related to combating discrimination. The guide covers the definition and types of discrimination, national and international legal frameworks, the identification and documentation of discrimination, methods of initial legal intervention, application procedures before competent mechanisms, legal support, communication, and advocacy.
The “Fieldwork Report” includes the case examples and legal concepts used in the workshops as well as the results of pre- and post-workshop surveys. While demonstrating changes in participants’ levels of awareness, the report also provides concrete examples and field data on the forms of discrimination encountered by people living in deep poverty.
Through the project, we aimed to increase people’s knowledge of mechanisms for seeking rights and remedies, strengthen access to legal support services, and enable civil society organizations to become more effective actors in combating discrimination.
DATAFICATION AND SHARING OF DATA ON DISASTER POVERTY IN ISTANBUL
We implemented the “Datafication and Sharing of Data on Disaster Poverty in Istanbul Project” between February 2024 and February 2025 with support from the Digital Transformation Fund, coordinated by the Support Foundation for Civil Society in cooperation with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and Türkiye Mozaik Foundation.
Within the project, we strengthened our institutional digital infrastructure while also beginning to produce, collect, and share data on disaster poverty as a dimension of poverty linked to disasters.
Strengthening Digital Infrastructure
During the project, we developed new digital tools to make our support and solidarity work more systematic, accessible, and trackable. We launched e-card and digital campaign applications and reorganized the structure and content of our website. These efforts aimed to improve the digital systems used in our support processes, make it easier to participate in campaigns, and ensure that information gathered through fieldwork is recorded more systematically.
Producing Data on Disaster Poverty
The impacts of disasters are not limited to physical destruction and material loss. Displacement, loss of income, housing problems, the weakening of social support networks, discrimination, and psychological effects can all deepen poverty in different ways after a disaster.
Within this framework, the project included research focusing on the experiences of people who had to leave their cities and settle in Istanbul following the 6 February earthquakes. The research aimed to make visible the needs, difficulties, and coping strategies of earthquake survivors trying to rebuild their lives in another city.
Earthquake, Migration and Poverty Report
As part of the project, we published the report “Earthquake, Migration and Poverty: The Situation and Needs of Earthquake Survivors Who Settled in Istanbul.” The report was based on in-depth interviews with 11 earthquake survivors who had settled in Istanbul. We examined participants’ losses during and after the disaster, migration and resettlement processes, economic difficulties, housing conditions, social relationships, experiences of discrimination, and psychosocial needs.
The research paid particular attention to the distinct challenges faced by women, children, and people with disabilities after the disaster. Drawing on the interviews, we assessed care responsibilities, access to education and health services, the difficulty of finding suitable housing, and barriers to reaching support mechanisms. Participants were selected through purposive sampling in order to understand how disasters affect people living under different social and economic conditions. The qualitative data from the interviews were analyzed thematically, identifying common problems, needs, and experiences and evaluating them alongside the relevant literature. Through the report, we drew attention not only to the immediate needs of people who settled in Istanbul after the earthquake, but also to their long-term needs in housing, livelihoods, health, education, social inclusion, and psychosocial support. We emphasized that post-disaster response and recovery policies should be developed through a rights-based, long-term approach that takes into account the differing living conditions of displaced people. Through the project, we aimed to strengthen our capacity to produce data on how disasters deepen poverty, make the experiences of displaced earthquake survivors visible, and contribute to sharing this knowledge with public institutions, local governments, and civil society organizations.
2023
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DISASTER AND ANTI-POVERTY POLICIES AFTER THE ECONOMIC CRISIS AND THE 6 FEBRUARY EARTHQUAKES
With support from the Türkiye Representation of Heinrich Böll Stiftung Association, we implemented the Recommendations for Disaster and Anti-Poverty Policies after the Economic Crisis and the 6 February Earthquakes Project in 2023.
Poverty, already deepened by the economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, became an even broader rights issue after the 6 February earthquakes, affecting access to housing, food, health, education, energy, transportation, and other essential areas. During this period, we argued that disaster and anti-poverty policies should not be limited to emergency relief and individual assistance, but should instead be addressed through a rights-based and multidimensional approach encompassing preparedness before disasters, access to essential services, and long-term recovery.
As part of the project, we carried out a parliamentary monitoring study examining rights-based legislative proposals related to disasters and poverty submitted during the 27th and 28th terms of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye. With contributions from Deep Poverty Network volunteers, we analyzed the rights areas and social groups targeted by the proposals and visualized the resulting trends through charts.
The study showed that a significant share of the legislative proposals remained limited to individual measures targeting specific people or groups rather than addressing public services and structural problems. We highlighted the inadequacy of policies focused solely on immediate post-crisis needs and short-term support in tackling the poverty-deepening impacts of disasters.
In this context, we presented three core policy recommendations to members of parliament. We emphasized that people unable to participate in full-time employment should not be excluded from social policy, and that the economic and social rights of those unable to access regular employment because of care responsibilities, disability, illness, age, or precarious working conditions must be protected. We recommended that disaster policies go beyond responding to immediate post-disaster needs and include preparedness, risk reduction, and long-term recovery. We also called for comprehensive policies that strengthen public services in housing, employment, transportation, energy, education, and nutrition rather than relying on individual aid mechanisms in the fight against poverty and disaster-related deprivation.
During the parliamentary monitoring study, we also observed that rights-based legislative proposals were generally prepared independently by individual members of parliament. In our advocacy meetings with MPs from different political parties, we discussed preparing joint legislative proposals, establishing regular cooperation mechanisms between parliamentarians and civil society organizations, and strengthening rights-based social policies during the 28th term of Parliament.
Because proposals submitted after the 6 February earthquakes focused largely on individual forms of support, we ran a social media campaign ahead of the 2023 general elections titled “We Are Looking for MPs Who Will Fight Deep Poverty.” We invited parliamentary candidates to develop long-term, multidimensional policies across rights areas such as housing, nutrition, education, health, energy, and social security, and received support from candidates representing different political parties. In the “Recommendations for Disaster and Anti-Poverty Policies Report,” published as part of the project, we brought together the findings of the parliamentary monitoring study, experience gained through advocacy meetings, and policy models that could serve as examples in disaster response. Through the project, we aimed to make visible the ways disasters deepen poverty, monitor legislative activity through a rights-based lens, and strengthen cooperation between civil society and policymakers.
2021
ABSENT STORIES
In the first year after the Deep Poverty Network was established, we carried out the “Research on Deep Poverty and Access to Rights During the Pandemic” to examine how people living in poverty were able to access fundamental rights during the pandemic. Alongside the research, one and a half years of regular support and empowerment work highlighted the need for different forms of storytelling that could convey experiences of poverty without reducing them to numerical data.
“Absent Stories” aimed to make visible the words and narratives of people who directly experience poverty. In the first part of the book, we included the stories of fourteen people who had participated in the work of the Deep Poverty Network. We transformed the experiences they shared into narrative texts. Before publication, each story was read by the person whose experience it represented and finalized in line with their feedback. Depending on participants’ preferences, some narratives used real names while others kept identities confidential.
At the end of each story, we included relevant legislation, research findings, and up-to-date information related to the experience described. In this way, personal narratives were addressed together with the structural conditions and rights violations that produce poverty.
The first story in the second part of the book was written by journalist and activist Hacer Foggo, who has worked in the field of poverty for many years. We also compiled, in diary form, everyday human rights stories encountered by the Deep Poverty Network during neighborhood visits, phone calls, and support activities.
With “Absent Stories,” we aimed to contribute to understanding poverty as a human rights issue and to discussing experiences of poverty in the words of the people who live them.
2020
RESEARCH ON DEEP POVERTY AND ACCESS TO RIGHTS DURING THE PANDEMIC / RECOMMENDATIONS FOR LOCAL GOVERNMENT SOCIAL SUPPORT PROGRAMS IN TIMES OF CRISIS
The COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown measures had a profound impact on low-income households with insecure livelihoods. Through the #ChangeFromHome campaign, the Deep Poverty Network provided basic food and care support to more than 2,000 households in Istanbul. During the support work, we observed that many households applying for social assistance were unable to meet their basic needs because social assessments could not be carried out during the pandemic, application processes were prolonged, or the assistance provided was insufficient. The conditions of crowded households living in one-room homes, people dependent on casual work for their livelihoods, households without regular access to running water, and children unable to access the internet and technological devices needed for distance education were not adequately taken into account in pandemic policies.
In response to this need, with support from the Türkiye Representation of Heinrich Böll Stiftung Association, we carried out the Research on Deep Poverty and Access to Rights During the Pandemic. The study examined people’s access to economic, social, and cultural rights during the pandemic and aimed to develop recommendations for local governments on social support programs that could be implemented in similar periods of crisis.
We conducted in-depth interviews with a total of 103 people living in twelve districts of Istanbul, including Ataşehir, Beyoğlu, Çekmeköy, Fatih, Şişli, and Ümraniye. In addition to demographic information, the interviews explored the extent to which participants were able to access rights related to education, health, nutrition, care, working life, safety, and participation in social life before and during the pandemic. Participants’ difficulties, proposed solutions, and expectations from social policy were also central themes of the research.
Field interviews were conducted between July and September 2020, and analysis of the qualitative and quantitative data was completed in October 2020. The in-depth interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis. While participants’ districts were accurately reported, pseudonyms were used in the narratives to protect personal information.
The research showed that in times of crisis, social support must be provided without delay through a rights-based approach; application and social assessment processes must be made accessible; and access to fundamental rights related to food, housing, health care, education, and care must be addressed together. On this basis, we developed social policy recommendations and proposals for crisis-period support programs for local governments.
2016
OUR MODEL FOR PREVENTING THE INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSMISSION OF POVERTY: ÇİMENEV SCIENCE AND ARTS CENTER
Çimenev was established to strengthen, through art and science, the self-confidence of children whose confidence had been damaged by socioeconomic discrimination in the social environments in which they lived — such as school and neighborhood settings — and to prevent school absenteeism and dropout. Çimenev operated from January 2016 to January 2021. The Çimenev Model reached young people, women, children, and civil society organizations working in these areas from a wide range of backgrounds.
For Çimenev, the two most important goals were “strengthening children’s self-confidence” and “building families’ resilience.” From its establishment onward, Çimenev worked with 150 children, 64 women, 25 young people, 108 families, and 320 volunteers. The most meaningful form of support for families is to help them gain the resilience to meet their own needs without depending on an association, municipality, or other civil society actor. For example, one activity involved explaining to families that education is legally free of charge when schools requested enrollment fees and supporting them in communicating with the school and asserting their own rights. For children, one of the most important needs is “knowing that there is a safe place and that they can reach it.” It is essential for children to be in an environment free from violence where they can express and communicate their emotions.
Children’s Programs at Çimenev
After-school activities and child-support programs were organized. Three-hour programs were held every weekday, along with summer schools. Activities included academic support such as learning multiplication tables and reading books; science-related activities such as technology, philosophy, and chess; arts including music, crafts, drama, marbling, cartooning, and diction; free-time play; dance; yoga; and gardening.
Women’s Programs at Çimenev
The women’s programs, designed for the mothers of children registered at Çimenev and for women living in the neighborhood, aimed to strengthen women’s cognitive skills and parenting capacities. Program content was shaped periodically according to women’s needs and requests. Workshops included literacy development, technology for women, tea sessions for the psychological support group, basic sewing, handicrafts, the Women’s Health Education Program with TAP Foundation, and the Hayat Dolu Buluşmalar program with AÇEV. An adult library was also established to increase the effectiveness of the workshops.
Additional Activities
Through home visits, the Çimenev Model observed children’s living environments and periodically visited parents’ homes to assess family relationships and circumstances. Families’ needs were identified and reports were submitted to the municipality.
Through school visits, the Çimenev Model also met periodically with schools to assess children’s school lives and their relationships with teachers and school administrations. The data collected were evaluated together with Çimenev’s volunteer child-development specialists and psychologists and taken into account in children’s individual follow-up and programs.
Within the scope of volunteer work, training and supervision were also provided to strengthen and support Çimenev volunteers from universities, public institutions, and the private sector who were responsible for children’s activities and workshops.