Social partners representing both employers and employees from the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean meet in Turin to participate in the kick-off conference of the three-year regional project (2011-2013) launched by the ETF.
The project focuses on institutional capacity building of employer organisations and trade unions engaged in VET in neighboring countries of the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean region, with special attention to the role of social partners in continuing vocational training (CVT).
The implementation of the project is supported by an Advisory Expert Committee (AEC), which is composed of members representing European employer organisations and trade unions, Eurochambers, Eurofound, the European Economic and Social Council and the International Training Centre of the ILO, Euromed, ITUC and 2 representatives selected among the project participants.
Structured in two components, mutual learning and reinforcement of capacities at national level, the project intends to closely link the two components through permanent interaction and exchange of information during the activities and by the production of methodological tools.
The conference is the first activity of the mutual learning component which in practical terms will include the following activities/deliverables:
A) Annual regional meetings
B) Regional capacity-building actions
C) Online platform for discussions and sharing of documents
D) Methodological notes
E) Regional mapping
During the conference participants will be informed about the project content and steps. The project virtual platform will be presented. This tool will support the project and give participants full access to project information, documents of interest in the field, links and concretely contribute by bringing and exchanging relevant information.
In order to give participants a picture of different activities in which they can be engaged, examples of different roles that social partners have in VET/CVT policy- making and practices in different EU countries will be discussed.
Participants will be invited to gather in groups to see why social partners should be engaged in CVT and how. The reporting from the workshops will collect proposals that participants can use after they have returned home.
During day 2 workshops activities will allow developing working methods and processes that they can use when their organisations are engaged in CVT issues first separately and then in partnership. Recommendations from all four workshops of this conference will be used as inputs to the first methodological note that will be finalised during year 2 of the project.
Before the conclusions participants will hear about the activities of the European Union in the field and two examples of cooperation in social partnership in the Mediterranean region through the Union for the Mediterranean and Tresmed4 project managed by the Economic and Social Council of Spain.
At the end of day 2 participants will meet in country groups together with ETF staff to discuss next activities of the project national component.
Hyperlink http://www.etf.europa.eu/web.nsf/pages/Social_partners_in_Vocational_Education_a nd_Training_in_the_Southern_Mediterranean

Type of Event: ETF general event
Place: Torino (Italy)
Date: 07/18/2011
Topic(s): Policies and Systems
Organiser: Gerard Mayen, Cristina Ricote Bucero ;
Contacts: Gerard Mayen, Cristina Ricote Bucero;