"From Recession to Recovery:
Local Partnerships to Rebuild Employment "

16 - 17 February 2010
Vienna

 

Discussed themes / Agenda / Rationale / Contact

 

Discussed themes

PLENARY SESSION 1: PUTTING IN PLACE JOBS THAT LAST: WHAT CAN THE LOCAL LEVEL DO?
	Introduction by the OECD Francesca Froy, OECD LEED read also Putting in place jobs that last - A guide to re-building sustainable employment at the local level By Francesca Froy and Sylvain Giguère, OECD LEED
	New skills for new jobs Robert Strauss, Head of Unit, Employment Strategy, CSR & Local Development, DG Employment, Social Affairs & Equal Opportunities, European Commission, Chair of the OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local Governance
	Integrating workforce and economic development for quality job creation Virginia Hamilton, Executive Director, California Workforce Association, US
	Rebuilding sustainable employment: the contribution of local employment services Jan Hendeliowitz, Director, Employment Region Greater Copenhagen & Zealand, Denmark, Chairman, OECD LEED Directing Committee
	An inclusive recovery: tackling disadvantage in a new economic context Nancy Neamtan, President, Director General, Chantier de l’Économie Sociale, Canada
Partnerships in the recovery: rebuilding employment at the local level By Michael Förschner, Forum Team Co-ordinator, at ZSI- Centre for Social Innovation, Austria

 

CONCURRENT THEMATIC WORKSHOPS
Supporting job creation	Manage change	Ensuring inclusiveness	The ‘ABC’ of partnership working
Anticipating new areas of growth: greener jobs and skills	Getting things done: the role of local development agencies Read also Promoting entrepreneurship, employment and business competitiveness The experience of Barcelona	Social economy and social entrepreneurship – a pathway to employment Read also Improving social inclusion at the local level through the social economy	Creating a partnership: engaging partners and creating trust
Entrepreneurship and self-employment Read also and Skills for entrepreneurship	Building career clusters: supporting employment retention and progression	The public sector, a source of good quality jobs for all?	Getting things done: how to ensure implementation?
Getting the young into jobs	Re-growing smaller or smarter? - the impact of demographic change on skills and employment	Female employment: a new work/life balance?	Improving partnerships’ work: monitoring, evaluation and auditing

Two interactive sessions of 30 minutes were organised featuring discussions around innovative partnership initiatives and other topics of interest to partnership practitioners.

Networking session: local initiatives for skills, jobs, social inclusion and economic development 17 February 2010, session 09.15 – 10.15

2010 Vienna Action Statement on Partnerships Final version adopted by Forum members at the 6th Annual Meeting of the OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local Governance

 

PLENARY SESSION 2: LESSONS LEARNT AND THE WAY FORWARD This session reviewed the key conclusions of the 12 thematic workshops and reflected on how partnerships and other local development actors can contribute to rebuilding employment in a new context and how governments can facilitate partnership working.
	Key messages from thematic workshops Ekaterina Travkina, OECD LEED
	Interactive Voting System

 

Agenda

Download the agenda.

 

Rationale

Although the latest economic indicators suggest that a recovery may be in sight, the experience of previous economic downturns shows that it will take long before employment gets back to pre-recession levels.  There is also a major risk that many of the unemployed drift into long-term unemployment and lose connection with the labour market and a large share of today’s unemployment becomes structural in nature in the next years. 

Rebuilding employment, ensuring progression and accessibility for all is not an easy task.  Even during the period of strong economic growth and low unemployment, net wages and income have stagnated for a large proportion of the population while income inequalities have increased. In many prosperous regions firms did not see sufficient incentives to invest in and better utilise the skills available in the workforce and the quality of employment has therefore become a neglected issue in some OECD countries. Youth unemployment remained high in many countries, and if connections to the labour market or training are not established today, more young people will drift into long-term unemployment. Other vulnerable groups suffer dramatically from the recession.

While solutions are put in place to address urgent needs, new ways of working are required to create more sustainable, more productive and more equitable employment for the future.  New approaches are needed to help people stay and progress in employment through greater skills utilisation. New skills are crucial to the development of a greener economy and in order to release its job creation potential.  Social entrepreneurship can contribute to providing sustainable solutions to those most at risk of exclusion from the labour market.

Working in partnership is required to address these multiple challenges. Partnerships, many of which were first created to deal with social and unemployment consequences of previous economic downturns, have accumulated a considerable amount of knowledge and know-how in bringing different stakeholders together, ensuring coordination and policy adaptation to local needs. Today many partnerships are affected by the economic crisis with their funding being reduced, programmes cut and organisational structures reorganised. New ways of working must be put in place for partnerships to be able to continue to perform their roles so vital for the recovery.  

The 6th Annual Meeting of the OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local Governance held in Vienna on 16-17 February 2010 brought together some 200 representatives of local partnerships, government officials, social entrepreneurs, business leaders, trade unions and academics to review how local development actors are adapting to this new reality and the innovations emerging on the ground to respond to these new challenges.

 

Contact

For further information please contact office@forum.zsi.at.