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Challenges and Opportunities in European Countries: Competitiveness, Skills, and Investment

This article explores the challenges and opportunities that European countries face in terms of competitiveness, skills, and investment. It discusses the need for more action and innovation, the importance of educational attainment and future skills, the issue of low-skilled workers, the policies to reduce early school leaving, the barriers to mobility, the investment in human resources, and the strategies for innovation in VET.

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Challenges and Opportunities in European Countries: Competitiveness, Skills, and Investment

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  1. Challenges and Opportunities that European countries face Tom Leney LeneyTO@qca.org.uk Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005 Johan van Rens, Director

  2. Competitiveness The ‘Lisbon scorecard’ EU is weak on competitiveness and performance. Disappointing economic and employment development. Lisbon goals will not be reached without more action and innovation Kok 2004

  3. Competitiveness: who leads? • Higher gross domestic product per capita than USA:onlyLuxembourg • More productive per hour:Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Different countries, different challenges - Productivity; employment; skills; investment; innovation • Successful models in Europe: the Nordic group? The case of Ireland? Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  4. Educational attainment General comparison

  5. Skills and competences to meet future needs? • Anticipating future skills and labour market needs: new risks, new approaches(Finland futures) • Which are the key competences?(Estonia reforms) • Entrepreneurship is one: active skills and/or skills for business start-up(Austria steps ahead) • Developing broad occupational competencies through workplace learning is now the key factor for VETreform in Europe(the Netherlands define) • Validation of informal and non-formal learning opens doors (France innovates; Slovenia reforms) Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  6. Low skills At present 80 million EU citizens are low skilled. By 2010 almost half of additional jobs will require tertiary level education and almost 40 % upper secondary level. Half (± 100 million) of EU workforce has to up skill

  7. Lifelong learning: target low-skilled groups in the workplace • The challenge for participation in lifelong learning. • Only 5 EU member states reach the EU target: UK, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands. • Variations between sectors: Communications/textiles • Workers with lower education attainment six times lower chance to participate in training (Frico Cheese) • Older workers (Sparbanken 55+), workers in declining industries (Poland, re-skilling mining regions),migrant groups (AEDGP, Romania), workers in small companies (Japan, automotive)…… • From initiatives to strategy? (Denmark) Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  8. Early school leavers Policies exist but benchmark of  10 % will not be reached by all. UK disappoints. Vocational streams and work-based learning help, but quality, flexibility, innovative links to the world of work are necessary

  9. Quality VET reduces the numbers of early school leavers • EU countries with a high proportion of young people in IVET tend to have high upper secondary completion rates and low dropout rates. Slovenia is a clear example. • The challenge is quality • Programmes attractive to learners and to enterprises • Flexibility: focus on the learner • Links to general education • Pathways to higher education • Quality IVET: a robust strategy - ETF’s message Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  10. Lowering barriers to mobility • Migration after enlargement lower than expected • VET can reduce barriers and ease frictions that currently inhibit the mobility of workers and learners • VET has an important role to play – but is not the major driver behind migration Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  11. Investment in human resources and quality EU spends similar % of GDP on education as USA (5.1%). But private spending is much lower. Investing in skills and literacy levels will increase quality economic growth, social cohesion and have major benefits for individuals

  12. VET: invest more and better! • Investing in VET brings rewards to companies and to individuals, though often seen as a cost or treated with reluctance. Returns on low level VQs? • Quality in initial VET, widening access to CVT, increasing European links all create costs as well as benefits: sources of funding? • Implications for governments, employers and individuals Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  13. Innovation strategies • Ensuring highly skilled VET professionals. • Emphasis on concrete action at decentralised level and by the social partners • Establish synergy between VET policies and economic and employment policies. Innovation agreements and tripartite commitment to foster investment in human capital • Special attention to key competences, ICT literacy and learning partnerships

  14. Innovation in VET teaching and learning • ‘Competence-based VET is explicitly aimed at the key issues in professions and careers, and prepares the learner’ (the Netherlands; Slovenia) • Focus on the learner: programmes and assessment • Embrace ICT • ICT skills • integration into work and learning processes • Innovation through learning partnerships (GOLO project) • ‘Bench learning’: tools to scale up innovation (OMC2) • Overcome the fragmentation of the VET profession (roles; locations; IVET/CVT) Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  15. Three questions ? • A lifelong learning strategy so stakeholders develop to optimise the learning opportunities for all target groups in the workplace? • Quality, attractiveness, flexibility of initial VET? • How will we best progress the agreed objectives, since countries are on different starting lines for VET and may develop differing visions of lifelong learning? Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  16. Peer learning? • Europe enables … • Country clusters • Sectoral and social partner initiatives • Networks, research, mobility, etc … involving wider publics • Knowledge transfer • Initiation • Adoption/adaptation • Capacity building • From initiatives to sustainable innovation: up scaling Lisbon - Copenhagen - Maastricht Consortium Global Skills Village Helsinki May 2005

  17. Contacts Cedefop Thessaloniki Greece info@cedefop.eu.int www.trainingvillage.gr http://communities.trainingvillage.gr Lisbon-Copenhagen-Maastricht Consortium QCA London Leneyto@qca.org.uk http://www.refernet.org.uk

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