The 2017 Age, Gender and Diversity Participatory Assessment (AGD PA) by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees gathered data through focus group interviews with asylum seekers, beneficiaries of international protection, elderly persons, and children in Bulgaria. The majority of asylum-seekers and beneficiaries of international protection still perceive Bulgaria as a transit country for various reasons, one being the lack of existing support for integration.

Since the end of 2013, there have been no targeted integration measures provided by the state, despite the adoption of a National Strategy on Asylum, Migration and Integration in June 2015. A year later, the Ordinance on the Terms and Conditions for Concluding, Implementing, and Terminating an Integration Agreement for Foreigners Granted Asylum or International Protection was adopted.

However, in April 2017, the caretaker government scrapped the Ordinance and did not adopt a new one until July 2017. The newly adopted document underlines the role of municipalities in the integration process of the refugees, and it also introduces a coordination body responsible for integration. The coordination body will be appointed by the Council of Ministers and should be one of the deputy prime ministers. The particular designated official is not yet known.

The report concludes with an extensive set of recommendations on integration.

Government: The government should appoint a deputy prime minister to be responsible for coordinating the application of the Integration Ordinance. The Ministry of Interior (MOI) should set up a mechanism for funding integration activities under the Integration Ordinance. The State Agency for Refugees (SAR) should consistently prepare integration profiles of individuals willing to remain in Bulgaria. The coordinating deputy prime minister, SAR, and MOI should proactively encourage local authorities to sign integration agreements. SAR, UNHCR, and NGOs should maintain existing coordination mechanisms between various stakeholders and motivate state institutions to take ownership of them.

Education and Language Learning: The Ministry of Education and Science should finalise the adoption of official school programmes in teaching Bulgarian as a foreign language and call public tender for learning materials. UNHCR and NGOs should actively support schools with asylum-seeking and refugee children through training of teachers and directors, material support, and cultural and tolerance workshops. Bulgarian language classes should be expanded, as well as classes for Bulgarian citizenship exams, driving licences, out-of-working hours courses, etc.

Labour Market: SAR, the Employment Agency, UNHCR, and NGOs should partner to improve labour market access. The Employment Agency, UNHCR, and NGOs should consider targeted vocational training to refugees based on the needs of the local economy.

Culture and Media: SAR and competent institutions, with the support of UNHCR and partners, should provide sensitisation and capacity-building activities to all relevant stakeholders working with persons of concern, including unaccompanied minors. UNHCR, SAR, NGOs, and other relevant institutions should train journalists and disseminate positive refugee-related stories and coordinate myth-debunking sessions at schools and in municipalities. SAR, UNHCR, and NGOs should regularly meet journalists, take them to field missions, and accumulate rational reasons for refugee support and integration.

Other: MOI should envision funding housing opportunities under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund. The Ministry of Health should facilitate the adoption of a procedure for deregistration of beneficiaries of international protection with general practitioners. The Ministry of Regional Development should facilitate the adoption of a special procedure for registration and deregistration of beneficiaries of international protection.