ASSOCIAZIONE GRUPPO ABELE ONLUS

The Gruppo Abele was set up in Turin in 1966. From the road to the road: a 30-year journey. Both symbolically and materially, the road represents hardship and marginalisation. But it also represents culture, change and prevention.

The Group works in social, cultural and political areas, combining reception facilities for people in difficulty, with prevention, training and information services. Privations cannot be countered simply by offering services, for a new cultural approach has to be adopted to destroy those mechanisms which generate exclusion and marginalisation.

Work in the most marginalised areas of society, and daily commitment to recovery from drug abuse have brought out the problem of immigration, especially of marginalised people without official documents.

For years, the Gruppo Abele has worked on reception initiatives for immigrants, such as:
- the hudna (truce) project and "drop-in" centres for drug-addicted immigrants;
- in a crisis centre and safe apartments;
- the equal opportunities department freephone helpline for slavery victims run together with the Province of Turin;
- a reception centre for battered and sexually exploited women which offers training (staff, teacher, and student courses and seminars, etc.)
- Information (texts, aspe-migrazioni press agency, articles, exhibitions, etc.) and research.

The Gruppo Abele now involves about 350 volunteers, conscientious objectors and full-time staff. It consists of 45 organisations. Facilities are provided for drug addicts, minors and the seropositive. There are a number of levels of intervention: initial contact services, residential communities, home assistance, community apartments, street units.

A refuge was set up in march 2001 for female slavery, battering and violence victims of all nationalities, with room for children. The community admits about 400 people a year.

To provide information on the refuge work, the Gruppo Abele has created:
- a documentation and research centre, with material on social problems and hardships, now available in "pollicino", a cd-rom data bank;
- the università della strada, providing training courses for public and private workers;
- the ufficio scuola, which teaches parents, students and teachers about disadvantaged youths and prevention;
- the centro per la legalità, a research, analysis and documentation centre on crime and mafia.

The Group publishes Narcomafie, an information and analysis monthly on the mafia, drug trafficking and crime, and Animazione sociale, a monthly training journal for social workers.

It has its own publishing house (Edizioni Gruppo Abele). It has published its "annuario sociale" since 1997, with the latest data on social and crime-related issues.

Gruppo Abele also works in third countries on special projects for food safety, the young, work training and reintegration, and assists local communities in prevention programmes and in favour of humane prison conditions. Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Marocco, Mali.

INDIRIZZO
Associazione Gruppo Abele Onlus
corso Trapani 95
10141 Torino
Tel. +39 011 384.10.22 - 011 384.10.66
Fax +39 011 384.10.25
e-mail: articolo18@gruppoabele.org
sito web: www.gruppoabele.org
orario: da lunedì a venerdì 9,00 - 18,00

Contact
Laura Emanuel

Numero verde per donne vittime di tratta e sfruttamento
800 290 290
orario: 15,00 - 03,00