Bulgaria - Pro.BG
Following the lead of its sister station in Romania, Pro TV, Pro.BG has adopted the Pro philosophy of being responsible, getting involved and providing help and support where it is most needed. After only seventeen months on air, Pro.BG launched its first ever social campaigns in 2009.
The first of these, "Life after death!" - highlighting the issue of organ donation - was launched in April 2009. The campaign aims to provoke everyone to think about this issue and understand that a decision to donate organ can save the life of at least one person. With this campaign Pro.BG tells the stories of people who are waiting for transplants. From the very beginning, the campaign was supported by the Executive Agency for Transplantation, a department of the Ministry of Health. As the campaign developed, Pro.BG received the support of Bulgaria's new Prime Minister who proclaimed that he is ready to be a donor and that the government will give 96 million BGN in 2010 for transplantations. The Ministry of Health will launch its own donor campaign in 2010 and will use the well recognised logo of Pro.BG's "Life after Death!" campaign.
Pro BG's second campaign, entitled "Childhood, please" was launched in October 2009. The campaign aims to show the history of the "lost" generation in Bulgaria. Over 2 million Bulgarians have left the country to work abroad, forced by economic circumstances. Sometimes the children meet their parents just once every 2-3 years. The children remain in Bulgaria with their grandparents or just good people who look after them. How these children grow without parents' physical and physiological care, how they manage with the education and social adaptation - no Institution in BG has ever accepted this as a problem and there are no official statistics. As a result of Pro.BG's campaign, representatives of the authorities have acknowledged that such a problem exists and it is in the core of the rising % of suicides among the teenagers.
Both "Life after death!" and "Childhood, please" are ongoing campaigns which Pro.BG will continue to promote and support.
Other projects
- During 2009, PRO.BG supported advertorial and editorial campaigns of UNICEF, SOS Kinderdorf, Face to Face, Bulgarian Red Cross, amongst others, through the donation of airtime.
- Valentina Voikova, anchor of the prime time news, is a charity ambassador for the long running CSR campaign of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, helping the children of policemen who died whilst on duty.
- Liliana Slavova, head of the PRO.BG channel, is ambassador of a campaign helping women to get over cancer, organized by one of the biggest BG Foundations "Utre za vseki" ("Tomorrow for everyone").
