Background
European regions are currently grappling with significant challenges, including persistent labour shortages and changing skills needs, particularly in sectors like construction, healthcare, and STEM fields. Furthermore, demographic changes, notably an ageing workforce and a shrinking working-age population, not only affect the EU as a whole but might have impacts at regional level too, with trends showing that there is an increasing concentration of population in urban areas (especially capital cities) and a concurrent depopulation of some rural, sparsely populated areas.
The EU is tackling these issues through several key policy and funding initiatives. An example is the European Skills Agenda, which aims to strengthen sustainable competitiveness, ensure social fairness, build resilience, support the creation of high-quality jobs and address skills mismatches while fostering innovation at the sectorial or regional levels.
Related initiatives that support regional skills development include the roll-out of the Blueprint for Sectoral Cooperation on Skills and the Centres for Vocational Excellence which focus on creating education and training solutions for local needs, fostering high-quality vocational skills to young people and adults, and driving regional innovation and social inclusion. Furthermore, other initiatives include the Talent Booster Mechanism, which supports regions in training, retaining, and attracting people with the necessary skills and competences to mitigate the impact of demographic transition.
Objective
With its more than 2500 members, 20 Large-scale Skills Partnerships (LSPs) and 6 Regional Skills Partnerships (RSPs), the Pact for Skills brings together key actors in strategic ecosystems, facilitating joint public-private action at sectorial or regional level. RSPs in particular can play a crucial role in addressing existing challenges and enhancing regional cooperation on skills.
During this peer-learning-activity, Pact members will hear from experts, and will discuss with other stakeholders across Europe to exchange ideas and upscale good practices to further enhance upskilling and reskilling at the regional level in their day-to-day work and better address current and future skills needs. Furthermore, participants will learn how existing regional large-scale partnerships under the Pact for Skills are addressing skills development challenges at the regional level, including lessons learned and challenges faced to date; and discuss potential ideas to enhance regional cooperation and build synergies.