About us

Agata Smeralda was the name of the first child received by Florence's "Spedale degli Innocenti" on 5th February 1445.

Today, "Agata Smeralda" is a Project which works in the name of human dignity, from conception to natural death. For fifteen years it has been a steady presence in the Brazilian favelas of Salvador - Bahia, in the middle of the poorest of the poor: children from the street.

More recently it has also initiated solidarity projects in Albania, Ivory Coast, India, Sri Lanka, Jerusalem, Congo, Nigeria and Ecuador.

In Brazil over 10,000 children have been accepted by missionaries in the 160 welcome centres posted in the Bahia which, with the help of sponsorships, can provide healthy food, health service and the possibility of gaining access to school education.

Amongst these children, many suffer from severe disability, while there are numerous cases of blindness and brain damage.

There are over 100 small schools for literacy, ten family homes for girls "taken from the street", a health centre at the "Centro do Menor Joao Paulo II", in the Mata Escura favela and others on the outskirts of the city, work training centres for older kids, a Social Centre situated in the Alto do Perù favela, used by over 700 young people.

The Project offers the most gifted and willing youngsters the chance to study and the possibility to attend university with a scholarships.

"Agata Smeralda" works in close collaboration with the local Church and with missionaries (nuns, priests, laymen) from all countries of the world and even Florence.

The sponsors, and all those who wish to sponsor a child, can share in periodical trips to Salvador - Bahia, in the heart of the Agata Smeralda Project, where they can visit welcome centres and witness the difficult realities in which missionaries work, and discover the solid work carried forth with them by this humanitarian association.

"Agata Smeralda" not only collects funds and provides sponsorship, it is also an association which works, in its own way, to spread a lifestyle and culture of human dignity. For this reason, it has promised, and continues to organize, in Italy and abroad, awareness initiatives against paedophilia and sexual tourism, in order to promote a culture of peace and acceptance through a series of meetings, exhibitions, publications. Such events help to promote and defend the dignity of women, and to diffuse, particularly amongst the younger generations, a spirit of brotherhood, of hard work and gratitude – an antidote to the consumerist society in which often we are forced to live.

The Agata Smeralda Project is a Non-Profit Organization for Social Use (ONLUS), in compliance with law 460/97, registered at the Voluntary Registry of Regione Toscana with decree from the President of the Province of Florence nr. 63 of 14th November 1997, and Moral Body (D.M. 7th April 2000).