Minister of State for Social and Family Affairs Miklós Soltész and CEO of Auchan Hungary Dominique Ducoux inaugurated a new training centre in Fót, north of Budapest, on Wednesday. The new centre will play an important role in the training of disabled workers.

At the inauguration ceremony, Mr. Soltész stressed that large companies have an important role to play in drawing attention to the employment of the disabled. He added that it would be beneficial both to retailers and manufacturers if supermarkets shelves also stocked products that are manufactured by the close to 350 companies in Hungary that employ disabled people and receive state funding, using the "Help while you Shop" logo for instance.

Auchan CEO Dominique Ducoux stressed that "the value of the company is not represented by its investments, but by the people who work there – this is why continues training is so important".

Virág Kiss, the company’s HR manager, pointed out that Auchan has been employing disabled people since 2009 and was awarded the title of „Disability-friendly workplace” in 2010. The company currently employs 150 such workers, which represents 2,25% of the total workforce and disabled people are employed in each of the company's nineteen hypermarkets and at its central service centre. 25% percent of the company's disabled employees, a total of thirty people, are deaf and the goal is to have at least one deaf or aurally impaired employee working at each of the company's stores by the end of the year, she said, adding that new jobs have also been created especially for people with autism or mild mental disabilities.

The total cost of the new training centre was HUF 13 million. Auchan Hungary Ltd., which celebrates its 15th birthday this year, operates 19 hypermarkets in Hungary and employs approximately 8 thousand people. The hypermarket chain has become a major economic player over the past 15 years, investing some HUF 200 billion in Hungary to date.

(Ministry of Human Resources)