Assessing skills in the informal economy: A resource guide for small industry and community organizations
This guide is part of a series of ILO publications on skills and upgrading apprenticeship in the informal economy. It is based on nine case studies from Africa, Asia and Latin America and demonstrates that bottom-up skills assessments are feasible and yield multiple benefits, yet need to be managed well to be effective. A common feature across the cases is that processes are initiated by small industry and community organizations (SICOs) themselves, and therefore standards are designed, agreed upon and enforced by local labour market actors.
The guide is divided into three main parts: Part A is more analytical and contains an overview of skills assessment practices of small industry organizations, and discusses why SICOs engage in skills assessments. Part B provides practical insight into how to initiate, organize and implement skills assessment, which potential stakeholders to involve, and how to link assessment with formal skills systems. It also discusses some important constraints and how to deal with them. The resource guide concludes with Part C – a section on lessons learnt.