Labour market institutions and policies in the CIS: Post-transition outcomes
Labour market institutions and policies in the CIS: Post-transition outcomes
The International Labour Organization is the tripartite U.N. agency that promotes Decent Work through employment, social security, labour standards and social dialogue. Its work on skills development is guided by the conceptual framework on Skills to improve productivity, employment growth, and development agreed in 2008 by representatives of Governments, Employers’ Associations and Workers’ Associations. Research, policy advice, and pilot projects and technical cooperation programmes to apply good practices in different circumstances across its 185 member States aims to boost the employability of workers, the productivity and competitiveness of enterprises, and the inclusiveness of economic growth. The ILO Secretariat in offices in 40 countries works with Ministries of Labour, employers’ organizations, and trade unions to integrate skills development into national and sector development strategies in order to better meet current labour market needs and to prepare for the jobs of the future; to expand access to employment-related training so that youth, persons with disabilities and other vulnerable groups are better able to acquire skills and secure productive and decent work; and to improve the ability of public employment services to provide career guidance, maintain labour exchange services, and deliver active labour market programmes.For more information regarding the ILO’s work on skills and employability go to: http://www.ilo.org/skills/lang--en/index.htm; for ILO/Cinterfor's Knowledge Management Plarform, see: http://www.oitcinterfor.org
Career guidance and counselling, career education and lifelong development of skills for employability are key for success in learning activities, effective career transitions, livelihood planning, entrepreneurship and in increasing labour market participation. They are instrumental in promoting skills utilization, recognition (RPL), as well as in improving enterprise human resource management.
Career development activities encompass a wide variety of support activities including career information and advice, counselling, work exposure (e.g. job shadowing, work experience periods), assessment, coaching, mentoring, professional networking, advocacy, basic and employability skills training (curricular and non-curricular) and entrepreneurship training. It is often an area which is fragmented across different ministries (e.g. education, TVET, employment, youth) requiring an effort to achieve the necessary coordination to provide adequate support to individuals during learning, employment and unemployment/inactivity periods.
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Working papers, reports, and other publications from international organizations, academic institutions and bilateral agencies. Research findings to stimulate informed debate on skills, employment and productivity issues.
This paper describes the development of labour market institutions and policies in seven
Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries and Georgia during the transition
period up to the year 2007, thus characterizing the condition of these institutions
at the eve of economic crisis. It shows that in many CIS countries, public employment
services lost resources, staff, and authority during the transition period, which reduced
their capacity to replace lost income for unemployed workers, or to redirect them to new
or better jobs. This attrition of the PESs was mainly due to policy choices made early on
in the transition process with respect to their source of funding and the overall design of
labour market institutions. In the early 1990s with rapidly rising unemployment and job
destruction accompanied by large-scale informalization of work, these countries adopted
models from well-functioning developed economies, which were ill-fitted to the national
environments. After almost two decades of transition, the typical outcomes in CIS include
liquidation of insurance-based employment funds and shifting of expenditures to the state
or local budgets, abolition or mergers of labour market institutions, and a partial replacement
of unemployment insurance with targeted social assistance. The paper argues that an essential first step to alleviating the impact of recession-related unemployment in
CIS countries is loosening eligibility criteria and improving funding for existing labour
market programmes, followed by increasing the capacity of the existing national public
employment services and establishing a regulatory framework for the proper functioning
of private employment agencies.
Countries and territories:
