Children in Huế warm-up for football training. Photo Blue Dragon

HÀ NỘI  The UEFA Foundation for Children and the Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation are working to help Vietnamese street children have more opportunities by using football as a catalyst for change.

According to the two organisations, children in tough circumstances in Việt Nam are extremely vulnerable to abuse and human trafficking.

The streets of Hà Nội are home to many children from across the country, scrambling to the capital to find work or flee family problems such as violence, drug abuse and poverty.

So both organisations encourage children to play football. The goal is not just to promote a healthier lifestyle combined with learning, but also to break the cycle of leaving home at a young age and entering the labour market.

This project will provide access to sports and recreational activities for 1,585 disadvantaged children in three provinces in Việt Nam.

They will all have the chance to improve their physical fitness, while also developing life and work skills which will improve their employability, thus providing themselves a pathway to escape poverty.

Aleksander Ceferin, president of UEFA and head of the board of the UEFA’s Foundation for Children, said football has a great influence for the benefit of society.

In the five years since the UEFA Foundation for Children was set up, about 1 million children have benefitted from its activities worldwide, while it has provided support for projects in 100 countries on all five continents.

Through sport, the foundation is helping to give hope to children from difficult backgrounds to help them achieve their goals in life. VNS