A Study Tour to Poland “Designing policies in response to labour market challenges and within the EU policy framework” was organized recently within the EU-funded project ‘Support to Evidence-based Employment Policy Creation’ implemented in Serbia by the ECG-led Consortium. The project aims at helping Serbian labour market institutions to better plan active employment measures in response to the challenges and needs of the labour market.

Representatives from Serbia who participated in the Study Tour included  staff from the Ministry of Labour, the National Employment Service, social partners and other members of the Working Group on the National Action Plan for Employment for Serbia. General objective of the visit was to introduce the Members of the Working Group with the experience of an EU Member State in designing the employment policies in response to labour market challenges and through the translation of the EU guidelines into the national context, as well as with their experience in programming the ESF contribution to the national policy. Participants met with representatives of the Polish Ministry of Labour, the local employment office of Warsaw, and the Department for European Social Fund Management of the Ministry for Regional Development.

The project ‘Support to Evidence-based Employment Policy Creation’ is funded by the EU with an overall value of 1.200.500 Eur, and implemented by ECG in Consortium with Pole Emploi, EPRD Policy and Development, and FREN. The objective of the project is to improve the impact of the Serbian employment policy, to embed forecasting, monitoring and evaluation in the design and implementation of active labour market policies. This project consists of three components: Forecasting, monitoring and evaluation – the tools for evidence based employment policy creation,  Assisting preparation of the National Employment Action Plan (the NEAP) and  Adjustment of national classification of occupations to ISCO 08 standards. The beneficiary institutions include the Ministry for Employment, Labour and Social Policy and the National Employment Service. The project began in November 2012 and will last until September 2014.