| GB.267/TC/1
267th Session November 1996 |
| Committee on Technical Cooperation | TC |
FIRST ITEM ON THE AGENDA
Active partnership and technical cooperation, 1995-96
Introduction
1. The present paper shows the progress and changes achieved in the application of the Active Partnership Policy (APP), and provides an annual review of the performance of the ILO's technical cooperation programme. As in the past great care was taken to provide ample statistical data through graphs and appendices, including information that was specifically requested by members of the Committee. Because of the ongoing character of many of the activities described in sections I, V and VI, the size of the text itself has been kept as brief as possible. The full and accurate financial position for 1996 will become available only in April 1997. The changes introduced following the creation in 1996 of the new Bureau for the Promotion of Active Partnership and Technical Cooperation (PROPAR/TEC) resulting from the merger of the Bureau for Active Partnership (PROPAR) and the Promotion of Technical Cooperation Branch (PROMOTEC) are discussed briefly in section II.
I. Progress in the implementation of the Active Partnership Policy
2. Implementation of the Active Partnership Policy (APP) has been progressing at a satisfactory level. Constituents are aware of its importance and usefulness; the field structure has been strengthened; the roles and responsibilities of headquarters, Regional and Area Offices and the MDTs have been established; and the decentralization process is on course. Implementation of the APP has raised expectations, and the demand for ILO services at the country and regional levels has increased. The current environment, marked by change in donor policy and a decline in extra-budgetary resources for technical assistance, points strongly to the need to strengthen the partnership within the ILO and mobilize donors to finance the implementation of the plans of action that have been drawn up to meet country objectives. This section focuses on the progress made in the implementation of the APP and, drawing on the lessons learnt during the process of implementation, outlines some of the corrective measures envisaged.
Country objectives
3. A major component of the APP is the formulation of the country objectives. With very few exceptions, constituents in all the developing and transition economies have recognized and endorsed the country objectives approach. There are at least five reasons for this:
| (a) | attention is concentrated on priority needs, and activities are oriented towards target priorities. Selectivity helps avoid dissipation and increases the chances of attaining the selected objectives; |
| (b) | the consultation process for establishing country objectives has provided constituents with the opportunity to express their reservations and even criticisms regarding ILO programmes and approaches; |
| (c) | the participation of constituents in the choice of objectives facilitated their involvement in the implementation of the plans of action and enabled them to practise real tripartism; |
| (d) | the integration of these activities within a programming framework of two to three years enhanced complementarity and coherence; |
| (e) | follow-up and evaluation can be more easily carried out by all parties involved, and concerted corrective measures can be applied when needed. |
4. A number of lessons, however, have been drawn from the experience of establishing the country objectives. In order to increase effectiveness and efficiency, attention will be given to the following:
- Some country objectives are still pending. In some cases political unrest and instability have delayed their formulation; in others, lack of human resources has delayed the exercise. Wherever possible, concerted efforts would be made to complete the exercise for the countries concerned.
- Experience so far shows that successful country objectives documents, which are regarded as high-quality products, emerge from effective teamwork between the Area Office Director and the MDT with input, wherever necessary, from the technical departments. This practice will be pursued. A crucial factor in this process is the preparatory work, which should be undertaken by the Area Offices before the exercise is initiated, resulting in a realistic programming tool.
- Finally, the country objectives will not be regarded as a strait-jacket inhibiting flexible adjustment in the contents or the methods used in the ILO's activities.
Multidisciplinarity
5. Progress has been made in strengthening multidisciplinarity in ILO activities. Technical cooperation programmes are increasingly being formulated and implemented by pooling different disciplines that interact in a complementary fashion, such as the Employment Generation Programme in Cambodia. There are already indications of improved capabilities in the MDTs to analyse country situations using a multidisciplinary approach. The MDTs themselves have been engaged in team-building exercises. The nomination of one member of the team responsible for the coordination of all MDT activities in a given country provides a better guarantee of a coherent and integrated approach from the MDT and has already been instituted in some cases. Needless to say, the Area Office responsible for that country continues to have overall responsibility for the coordination of all ILO activities at the country level.
6. The practice of creating working groups within the MDT, or designating MDT specialists covering different subregions for the analysis of specific themes, is already followed in several regions with regard to activities on poverty alleviation, youth employment and employment observatories, respectively. The elaboration of the MDT work plans and their periodic review provide an occasion to identify and expand new multidisciplinary approaches. By bringing together the MDT specialists and the Area Office Directors, attempts were made not only to ensure proper evaluation of the approach and response to the country objectives, but also to ensure a synergy between the work plans of the MDTs and the Area Offices concerned.
7. Multidisciplinarity will be further promoted, with full cooperation between headquarters' technical departments and the MDTs, by inviting MDT specialists of different disciplines to participate either in ad hoc task forces for the elaboration of end-products, in response to specific urgent demands, or in the preparation of the action programmes, as envisaged in the programme and budget exercises.
Roles and responsibilities
8. The Active Partnership Policy has increased the responsibilities of Directors of Area Offices. Directors are the key players in the application of the APP at the country level. They are responsible for the country objectives process, from the stage of dialogue/consultation with constituents to the search at the local level for extra-budgetary funding for the plans of action designed to support the country objectives. In addition to the administrative and management functions related to the team itself, the Directors of MDTs are responsible for ensuring that high-quality technical services are provided in the implementation of the country objectives. The Personnel Department provided training in the area of management skills to selected Directors of Area Offices and MDTs and to senior staff from Regional Offices; such training programmes will need to be continued. Induction courses should be provided to newly appointed staff in order to upgrade their understanding of key socio-economic issues of concern to the ILO, the nature of the problems dealt with and the applicability of the solutions that have been devised or recommended by the ILO. The Promotion of Active Partnership and Technical Cooperation Department (PROPAR/TEC) will provide training and briefings on the APP, the management of technical cooperation, resource mobilization and donor relations.
9. Regional meetings were held in Bangkok, Abidjan and Lima for Directors of Area Offices, Directors and specialists of the MDTs, members of staff from the Regional Offices and, in some cases, the Chief Technical Advisers (CTAs) of inter-country projects. Headquarters staff also participated in all the meetings, which provided excellent opportunities to review the implementation of the APP, discuss resource mobilization in implementing country objectives, discuss major topics on a thematic basis, and conduct individual and group consultations on various issues, including technical, administrative and financial responsibilities and functions.
10. Given the importance of the field positions, special attention will have to be given to ensuring the selection of high-quality personnel with the required profiles. A review of the composition of the MDTs needs to be undertaken; it may be necessary to redeploy staff to match the specific needs of the regions. More flexible arrangements will be necessary within the MDTs to avoid situations where existing expertise is under-utilized, while demand for other specializations remains unsatisfied. The outcome of the current review of the field structure will guide the action eventually taken.
11. More frequent field-headquarters interaction will be ensured through regular consultations at headquarters with Area Office and MDT Directors, visits by Directors of technical departments and/or branch chiefs to the MDTs and joint working groups on action programmes and end-products.
Strengthening of tripartism
12. The Active Partnership Policy is increasingly regarded by ILO constituents as a particularly useful approach. It allows the provision of valuable policy advice to constituents at their request. Relations between team specialists and the social partners have become much more direct.
13. Tripartite dialogue, which is an essential part of the country objectives exercise, encourages ministries of labour and employers' and workers' organizations to discuss one another's concerns. In the Philippines, for example, the ILO specialist on workers' organizations organized a review meeting to consider the draft COR document, in which three main trade union centres took part. The observations and suggestions made during that meeting were then conveyed to a full tripartite meeting, and eventually incorporated in the final document. A similar exercise took place in Mali, where the employers' organization was invited by the employer specialist of the MDT to determine their position with regard to the country objectives. Informal discussions and consultations enabled the organization to agree on a number of priority themes, which were embodied in the final document after its endorsement by a tripartite meeting involving all concerned parties. Where country objectives exercises have been carried out in a tripartite forum this has helped to strengthen dialogue between constituents and interaction between them. Tripartite involvement has provided a platform for consultations and has generated a climate for consensus among the constituents around priority concerns of the ILO.
14. In a number of cases national tripartite committees have been set up to oversee the process of identifying and developing country objectives. This greatly facilitates selecting priority issues, monitoring and reviewing the implementation of plans of action, gaining support in mobilizing resources and involving the constituents at all levels of technical cooperation activities. Further efforts will be made to encourage constituents to set up such national tripartite committees.
15. It has been seen that, in all regions, the strengthening of the institutional capacity of employers' and workers' organizations is a recurrent and major aim of country objectives. Emphasis has to be given to building the capacities of the tripartite partners to enable them to participate actively in consultations and decisions and in the implementation of economic and social programmes at the national, subregional and regional levels. Support should also be given to activities that will increase capacity to represent constituents, enhance technical competence for the analysis and definition of policies and proposals for concrete solutions to emerging development problems, and develop aptitude for decision-making.
Fund-raising and the APP
16. It is now well recognized that the implementation of the APP has raised expectations and, as can be seen from the country objectives, increased the demand for our services at the country and regional levels. Adequate resources have to be found to satisfy that demand and implement the activities necessary to fulfil the country objectives. Experience has shown that resources can be mobilized for more comprehensive programmes that address major problems faced by different groups of countries, even in today's competitive environment. With its demand-driven approach, the Active Partnership Policy also provides a framework for the management of relations with donors and development partners both locally and at their headquarters.
17. Country objectives could provide the framework for sensitizing partners and mobilizing donors at the country level. Closer dialogue and working relationships will be encouraged, inter alia, with the World Bank, UNDP and bilateral donors, as this could lead to joint ventures and synergy and avoid duplication of effort. The Area Offices should ensure the dissemination of the country objectives at the country level, and PROPAR/TEC at donors' headquarters through the most appropriate channels.
18. The field structure has an important role to play in the promotion of technical cooperation and in fund raising. While the Regional Offices will reinforce close links with the regional development banks and with the heads of regional groupings, the Area Office Directors will maintain systematic contacts with the UNDP bureaux and with decentralized representatives of donor countries and financing institutions. With the assistance of the MDTs, more substantive discussions with donors on new issues could be held at the field level to ensure that they are topical and relevant. Chief Technical Advisers (CTAs) will be better trained and consulted in the resource mobilization exercise, since they operate at the front line and can provide substantial input, both technically and through their direct contacts with donors. This is especially important in countries without ILO offices, where the CTAs are the only ILO personnel available to constituents, UNDP and donors on a regular basis.
II. Implementation of the ILO strategy for technical cooperation
19.The further steps taken since mid-1995 to implement the strategy for technical cooperation, endorsed by the Governing Body at its 261st Session (November 1994),(1) are briefly outlined below. In this account emphasis is laid on progress made in mobilizing extra-budgetary resources and in enhancing the delivery system. Section I of this report, focusing on the implementation of the APP, sheds light on some other aspects contained in the strategy.
A dynamic resource mobilization strategy
20. One of the principal concerns of the strategy was to arrest the decline in extra-budgetary resources and lay the ground for future growth. As pointed out in section III, the scale of the programme in 1995, measured in terms of annual expenditure, was nearly the same as that of the previous year, thus stabilizing the programme after several years (i.e. since 1991) of continuous decline. Latest available expenditure figures for the first half of 1996, compared with the same period in 1995, confirm the same trend. Moreover, new approvals which also showed a decline since 1990, increased for the first time in 1995 (see figure 2 in section III). The major contributing factor was a significant increase in multi-bilateral approvals, largely offsetting the consequences of a reduced UNDP share.
21. Resource mobilization gained further momentum from the merger, in 1996, of the Bureau for Active Partnership with the Promotion of Technical Cooperation Branch. The Bureau is responsible for promoting, coordinating, facilitating and monitoring the implementation of the Active Partnership Policy and ensuring effective collaboration and interaction between the different components of the ILO structure in order to promote the ILO's technical cooperation programme as a major means of action, and for proposing the means to enhance its quality, relevance, coherence and impact. It develops strategies for resource mobilization and coordinates relations with donors. Consultation was initiated and communications sent to the field structure (Directors of Regional and Area Offices and MDTs) and to the Directors of Branch and Liaison Offices (the latter are located in donor countries). Both were asked to reflect on the potential of the social partners -- and not just the government -- to contribute to a revitalized and proactive resource mobilization strategy. Amongst the significant points underscored in this consultation, two are worth mentioning: the need to found the future strategy on an alliance involving, in addition to the ILO, the three other partners -- donors, national aid coordinators and constituents; and the need to explore opportunities to mount comprehensive programmes, as opposed to a myriad of small and scattered activities. Another issue raised was that of the new roles that may be assumed by the field structure, alongside headquarters, in tapping additional resources for ILO operational activities. There is a wide measure of agreement that the role of the field structure may and should be significantly strengthened. The replies received form the basis of additional guidelines and training. The guidelines are now being finalized.
22. As regards consolidating ILO dialogue and cooperation with the European Union (EU), since late 1995 a full-time official was assigned to the ILO Office in Brussels. This has already led to facilitated dialogue with the EU's most concerned divisions: DG-I (focusing recently on ILO support to Bosnia and Herzegovina), DG-VIII (specifically with respect to ACP countries) and DG-V (mainly on legal aspects), a high-level meeting with DG-VIII took place in Brussels in July, resulting in a joint analysis and programming exercise on integrated employment policies in three ACP countries. These would serve as pilot experiments for future cooperation. Discussions with the Director-General of DG-I (referred to in last year's report to the Committee), have resulted in the implementation of several large-scale projects in Asia. The EU's response to proposals concerning activities in Latin America is still awaited. The EU actively cooperates with the Turin Centre. Early in 1996 the Office gave its consent to a formal framework agreement along lines similar to those governing the relations between the EU and UNESCO; the EU's final agreement is expected soon. Dialogue with the EU addresses general development issues, fuelled in large part by the outcome of the recent global summits. The EU's recognition of the potential and unique contribution of the ILO, and its comparative advantage in development issues requiring a broad social consensus based on a tripartite approach, has been rather encouraging.
23. The Office has recently circulated guidelines to all concerned regarding the best approaches that need to be taken, particularly by the field structure, in order to enhance cooperation with the EU. The multidisciplinary teams have a particular role to play; the Budapest team has been successful in promoting joint cooperation, but others (in Africa, Latin America and Europe) are also increasingly intensifying contacts and consultations. The Office seeks to diversify its cooperation in all regions and in as many substantive fields of ILO competence as possible. Negotiations in Asia, expected to yield significant financial support for the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) are at an advanced stage. In general, a partnership with the EU is sought in respect of country-specific as well as subregional, regional and global activities. Finally, the scale of operations carried out with the financial support of the EU tends, in most cases, to be substantial: many of the projects submitted by the ILO and now being examined by the EU, involve budgets in excess of 1 million dollars, some even involving five.
24. With respect to the multi-bilateral segment of the programme the Office concentrated on three linked objectives: consolidating the existing partnership, expanding and diversifying the community of donor/partners, and developing new modalities alongside existing ones. As regards expansion, agreements have been finalized with Luxembourg, which enabled the Office to establish a presence in Sarajevo (Bosnia and Herzegovina), and with the Korean Employers' Federation. The community of donors now involves 18 partners. As regards new modalities, the broad understanding with Denmark, reported to the Committee last year,(2) was formally put into effect in June this year. It complies with Denmark's policy of "active multilateralism", and promotes a multi-annual programme as opposed to a project-by-project approach; provides greater planning flexibility; it confers upon the ILO further responsibility for the formulation of sound programmes; and it broadens and enhances the dialogue between the donor and the ILO. The Office has continued to seek similar arrangements with other partners with a view to enhancing the scope, focus and pertinence of the programme.
25. In line with the commitment in the paper on the ILO's technical cooperation strategy to enhance ILO/UNDP cooperation,(3) the Office actively pursued dialogue with the Programme. The relationship is, however, undergoing profound change in the wake of the introduction by the UNDP of new successor programming arrangements and modalities of developing technical cooperation, chiefly those contained in Executive Board decisions 95/23 and 96/31. The principal operational changes concern the shift from a project to a programme approach, and the generalization of the national execution modality. Equally significant is UNDP's increasing focus on Sustainable Human Development (SHD), of which the Committee was informed in November 1995. This marks a reorientation of UNDP resources towards issues that largely coincide with the ILO's objectives, notably employment, poverty, women and the environment, as well as certain related themes, such as governance, democratization, participation and human rights. UNDP expects the ILO to become a major partner in setting in motion the policies advocated in its newly created Poverty Strategies Initiative. Further details are given in a separate paper before the Committee.(4)
26. The Office was able to increase significantly the number of new TSS-1 approvals in 1995 in all regions; this will enable it to associate itself with the preparation of comprehensive future programmes through upstream interventions focusing on key social aspects. Of particular significance was the approval early in 1996 by UNDP, under TSS-1 arrangements, of an innovative ILO programme: Jobs for Africa, Employment Generation for Poverty Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa. This builds on Commitment No. 7 of the Declaration adopted by the World Social Summit, which specifically refers to Africa and the least developed countries (LDCs). This multidisciplinary (and conceivably with respect to certain components, multi-agency) programme could produce spin-offs in several areas and make ILO contribution in this critical area more concrete and visible. The EU is keenly aware of and interested in the development of the programme. The document approved specifically states that "the participation of the social partners through tripartite procedures, as well as of other representative organizations (economic interest groups, cooperative and other community-based organizations), will be sought and promoted". Finally, although still modest in absolute terms, project-related activities, using the TSS-2 modality, have increased to nearly twice the amount spent in 1993 (see footnote 1 to Appendix I (A)).
27. As regards cooperation with the Bretton Woods institutions, progress in terms of approvals and expenditure over the last 18 months has been rather slow. The Office continued to reactivate operational collaboration in the face of financial constraints. ILO involvement in World Bank-based loans continued to concentrate on the fields of vocational training, enterprise development (including support to small-scale industry, establishment of social funds, labour-intensive works programme, informal sector and management development), social security, labour market policies and labour statistics. There were significant initiatives in terms of sensitizing the Bank staff to ILO's social perceptions, to tripartism and to its standard-setting function. In the process the Office gained better appreciation of the Bank's strategic thinking. One such important activity, benefiting the Office and the Bank staff, is summarized below in a box in section VI (Promoting cooperation between the ILO and the World Bank, following paragraph 135). Another was a tripartite seminar held in May this year, sponsored by the Economic Development Institute (EDI), in Washington DC, with ILO participation at senior level, which focused on promoting policy on labour issues. In the same month the President of the World Bank paid a visit to the Director-General in Geneva and reiterated the desire of the World Bank to cooperate more closely with the ILO. The senior-level Interdepartmental Strategy Group and the ILO-coordinated ACC-Task Force on Employment and Sustainable Livelihoods (set up following the World Social Summit) also seek to expand the current level of interaction.
28. The paper on ILO strategy suggested reviewing the role of RBTC resources, in keeping with the orientation derived from earlier discussions in the Committee. In 1995 (see Appendix III), more than 12 million dollars were spent. Although a fair amount of RBTC resources still support individual small-scale projects, there was increasing use of RBTC in the context of co-sharing, characteristically with TSS-1 activities which enabled the Office to undertake project preparatory work or to ensure follow-up on specific objectives identified in country objectives documents. A substantial share was devoted to supporting activities benefiting workers' and employers' organizations. In general terms, fewer RBTC allocations were disbursed on ad hoc and disjointed activities. (5)
Enhancing the delivery system
29. An important internal innovation, deriving from the interdepartmental projects and in harmony with the emphasis laid in the strategy paper on the issues of selectivity and sustainability (paragraphs 55 and 56), was the launch, in the 1996-97 biennium, of 13 cross-departmental action programmes, all addressing key social and labour problem areas. Special care is taken to make optimal use of multidisciplinary approaches wherever feasible and desirable. This initiative is directly inspired by the perceived needs of ILO constituents. Proposals concerning the action programmes will be included in the programme and budget proposals for the next biennium. Their expected output will enrich the ILO's experience and increase the range of operational options, which will be useful to the ILO's constituents. They are also expected to attract the interest of potential donors. Examples of issues addressed in action programmes currently in progress include privatization, restructuring and economic democracy, labour and social dimensions in export processing zones, the reform and development of systems of social protection, economic reform and structural change, promoting women's employment and participation in social funds.
30. A recurrent concern of the programme was to enhance complementarity between technical cooperation activities and international labour standards. The training manual on design, monitoring and evaluation of technical cooperation programmes and projects: a training manual, published in 1995 (and referred to in section III) contains specific brief guidance on how to integrate standards and technical cooperation, and this theme has since been further elaborated in separate, more specific guidelines. Some additional pertinent examples concerned close cooperation between the ILO Beijing Office and the Bangkok-based team, which resulted in providing information and advice on a wide range of standard-related issues to the Government and the social partners in China. Some 200 officials were trained, through a series of provincial seminars held over a three-year period, following China's ratification in 1990 of the Tripartite Consultation (International Labour Standards) Convention, 1976 (No. 144). Efforts were also undertaken in respect of the Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention, 1958 (No. 111) and the Chemicals Convention, 1990 (No. 170), ratified in 1995. Technical cooperation extended to South Africa in relation to prevailing labour legislation and the trade union situation in that country dates back to 1992. This support has intensified since 1995, when it rejoined the Organization, culminating in the redrafting of legislation and the ratification of the two fundamental ILO Conventions on freedom of association (Nos. 87 and 98). The Office paid increased attention to enhancing the capacity of MDT specialists -- not only experts on standards -- to create synergy between technical cooperation and international labour standards. Special emphasis was placed on promoting the universal ratification and full implementation of the fundamental Conventions on freedom of association, forced labour, discrimination and child labour. Training workshops were organized for members of teams in Santiago, Lima, Bangkok and Dakar.
31. Work on a technical cooperation information system (DEVINFO -- see paragraph 59 of the strategy paper) benefited from extensive additional consultation, through structured interviews and questionnaires, within headquarters as well as with the field structure. One of the major considerations was to create a system that did not place an excessive burden on the primary suppliers of information. The completion of the system and its validation will require more time, and will reflect the results of the current review by the Governing Body of proposals concerning the rationalization of the external offices. The first phase, however, has helped improve the use by headquarters officials of existing information sources and tools. As regards a manual on technical cooperation (paragraph 88 of the strategy paper), a draft outline was produced and further refined after consulting a wide range of potential users, including field and MDT staff directly engaged in promoting ILO field programmes. Drafting will start once a clearer picture emerges from the ongoing debate regarding the UN development system (and particularly the UNDP) which is expected to result in the formulation of new development strategies and procedures, as well as from the current ILO internal review and reforms referred to above. In the meantime, a review of the existing guidance contained in various ILO circulars, memos and instructions of the Director-General is being carried out with a view to bringing them up to date.
32. The strategic goal was vigorously pursued of focusing ILO support on carefully selected high-quality integrated programmes (paragraphs 57 and 58 of the strategy paper) along the lines of the successful IPEC programme (and the programmes on organizational and cooperative support to grass-roots initiatives (ACOPAM) and "Improve your business" (IYB)), which in 1995 (see section VI) attracted additional external funding as well as the Jobs for Africa programme. Another initiative favouring a programme approach concerned the completion of a Framework of Guidelines for the Reintegration of Demobilized Combatants through Training and Employment. This will benefit a growing number of countries emerging from armed conflicts. It is expected that these guidelines will be supplemented during the current biennium by work under an action programme (see paragraph 43 above) entitled Skills and Entrepreneurship Training for Countries Emerging from Armed Conflict. Both will assist national planners and policy-makers in the design and implementation of sound operational activities suited to specific post-conflict situations. Another initiative following the Copenhagen Summit concerns the launch each year of comprehensive country employment policy reviews: here the aim is to proceed from a comparative analysis of key labour issues to recommendations for international action in support of full employment, an objective that looks beyond mere job creation and examines workers' rights and the quality of the employment.(6) The Office also initiated preliminary work to develop comprehensive programmes focusing on improving conditions for women, the promotion of employment, the development of small- and medium-scale enterprises, and the improvement of industrial relations. Progress on these initiatives will be reported to the Committee.
33. The ILO enterprise strategy is essentially designed to promote effective collaboration between the ILO and enterprises in such key areas as employment creation, human resource development, improved working conditions and labour management relations, in accordance with the basic tripartite structure and principles of the ILO. The development of coherent and effective portfolios of ILO enterprise-related expertise and services is one of the key strategy components, in line with a clear recommendation in the strategy paper (paragraph 57). Several interdepartmental task-force meetings have been held since 1995 with a view to forging an Office-wide consensus on the concepts and main thrust of the ILO's enterprise-related activities. It is expected that some of the resources that will be mobilized to implement the strategy will be derived from non-traditional sources, including NGOs.
34. Design, monitoring and evaluation are discussed in section III. In line with the recommendation in the strategy paper (paragraph 61), emphasis was placed on enhancing the capacity of ILO staff at all levels to apply design, monitoring and evaluation procedures. The International Training Centre, Turin, is actively involved. In July 1996 a workshop was held on the design and evaluation of programmes and projects for the Budapest team. The Office increasingly attempts to draw nationals into training activities to enable them to assume more confidently monitoring and evaluation tasks without which the successful implementation of the "national ownership" concept is inconceivable. This is consistent with the latest triennial policy review of operational activities (General Assembly Resolution No 50/120, 1995), which highlighted in particular the need to foster national evaluation capacity.
III. Recent developments in ILO technical cooperation
35. After successive years of decline in expenditure -- nearly 24 per cent in 1994 compared with the previous year -- the 1995 figure (see Appendix I) shows stability: a decline of only 0.6 per cent, and that for the first six months of 1996 only 2 per cent lower than during the same period in 1995.
36. While UNDP funds continued to decline, though to a lesser extent than in 1994, both the UNFPA and the trust fund and multi-bilateral sectors show an increase. Trust fund/multi-bilateral financing, already exceeding half the total expenditure in 1994, further strengthened in 1995, when it stood at 54 per cent of total expenditure. In the first six months of 1996 an increase of nearly 5 per cent compared with the same period in 1995 was registered.
37. In terms of regional distribution the changes have been slight for the major regions, and do not suggest any basic shift in donors' priorities; expenditure in the Arab States, by contrast, increased twofold.
38. The Office's concern for the timely delivery of projects inputs, and the internal mechanisms designed to promote it, have maintained the delivery figure at 63.3 per cent, higher than that of 1994 (62.9 per cent) (see Appendix I (C)).
39. Particularly encouraging is the continued reversal of the negative approval trend observed in earlier years. The figures for 1995 show a remarkable growth in the volume of approved projects: $114 million compared with $69.6 million in 1994 and $79.2 million in 1993. Unfortunately, the share of UNDP in approvals has fallen, and stood at 14.8 per cent of total approvals in 1995, compared with 25.7 per cent the previous year. Considerable growth in approvals under trust funds and multi-bilateral arrangements largely compensated for this fall.
40. While in monetary terms the level of financing by UNDP shrank considerably, the UNDP/ILO partnership remains strong. It enabled the ILO to extend support to a large number of developing countries, some still under the "old regime", others increasingly under the new financial modalities: TSS-1 for policy or sectoral ventures "upstream" and TSS-2 for project-related activities. The latter continued to grow in importance in 1995 (see Appendix I (A)). However, the benefit of the relationship lies beyond finding issues, in the far-ranging consultations and dialogue on the thrust and modalities of multilateral development aid. UNDP's own reorientation from a multi-sectoral all-embracing aid agency to one that seeks to provide more focused support for Sustainable Human Development (SHD) has made it a natural ally for the ILO's work. In a separate paper before the Committee some of the salient decisions and trends concerning the UN development system are discussed.
41. A central concern of the programme has been to enhance the quality of technical programmes in the framework of the Active Partnership Policy. By means of a process of intense consultation and dialogue with ILO constituents and partners, the Office has been able to assess and address their priority needs and perceptions and formulate operational programmes at the country level. The creation and deployment of the 14 multidisciplinary teams in the various subregions, the redefinition of roles and responsibilities assigned to headquarters and to Area and Regional Offices brought the ILO's accumulated technical expertise, capacities and comparative advantage closer to its constituents. The challenge for the programme now is to translate the objectives identified into viable operational programmes and projects. The issue of securing adequate extra-budgetary resources remains central to the success of the implementation of the programmes. Recent efforts made by the Office in this regard, and reported in section II, suggest that the Office may expect to improve the funding situation. The outcome, however, depends not only on the ILO's own efforts but also on the active support of the recipients and of its partners.
Design, monitoring and evaluation of operational activities
42. Activities in 1995-96 continued to focus on reinforcing the capacity of both ILO staff at headquarters and the field and national staff to evaluate their own activities. To achieve this, a multifaceted strategy has been adopted. First, training workshops were held in cooperation with the Turin Centre and in the field on the design, monitoring and evaluation of technical cooperation programmes and projects, using the training materials developed in 1994. During the period under review, five training seminars and workshops were organized, involving 126 persons, two in Chiang Mai, Thailand, and one at headquarters. In addition, more than 83 experts, consultants and field staff were briefed on design, monitoring and evaluation concepts and procedures. Secondly, guides were prepared to fill gaps in the application of evaluation techniques: one on the terms of reference of independent evaluations and the independent evaluation of programmes and projects; the other on complementarity between standard-setting and technical cooperation activities.
43. A set of performance indicators, applicable to each technical field covered by the ILO, is about to be published and will be used to assess the impact of regular budget activities and technical cooperation programmes.
44. Finally, in addition to the annual thematic assessment papers on the evaluation of technical cooperation programmes and projects prepared for the Committee on Technical Cooperation, a new series of thematic evaluations covering regular budget programmes is being introduced. This series will also cover technical cooperation activities undertaken within the framework of the regular budget programmes.
Operational activities concerning women
45. The Office of the Special Adviser on Women Workers' Questions continued to promote and coordinate ILO policies, strategies, programmes and activities concerning equality for women workers, both at headquarters and in the field. One of the major activities during 1995 was the coordination of Office-wide preparations for, and participation in, the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing (September 1995). Another major area of activities is the provision of training on gender issues. A number of such training courses have been conducted both in the field and at headquarters, and more are planned for the future.(7) A report on the Conference (GB.264/4), as well as a proposal for ILO follow-up action (GB.265/4), have already been examined by the Governing Body. In March 1996, the Governing Body expressed strong support for a comprehensive and integrated programme to follow up on the conclusions of the Beijing Conference. In the course of 1995 a second interregional project was approved, concerning nine countries (see box).
| Training and information dissemination on women workers' rights |
A second interregional project, funded by the Netherlands Government, was approved in 1995. The project aims to contribute to the improvement of equal opportunities and treatment for women workers by developing and implementing awareness-raising activities and training on women workers' rights in nine countries. One of the main objectives of the project is to produce ILO training and information materials for the promotion of women workers' rights adapted to local contexts (the Modular Training Package on Women Workers' Rights and the Information Kit on International Labour Standards and Women Workers). The following activities are envisaged in each of the nine participating countries:
The dissemination strategies vary, depending on the country's perceived needs and previous training and awareness activities for the promotion of women workers' rights. |
Environment and sustainable development
46. The ILO's interdepartmental project on environment and the world of work demonstrated the importance of partnerships and alliances between the ILO's tripartite constituents and with other relevant institutions to promote practical action in this field. The major Norwegian-funded technical cooperation projects to support action by workers' and employers' organizations on environment and sustainable development continued to provide unique and relevant support to enable them to deal directly with these issues at the national, sectoral, local and enterprise levels. The interdepartmental project, with support from the Government of Norway, also prepared a series of National Desk Reviews which highlight the role of the ILO's constituents and other relevant institutions in implementing activities concerning the environment and the world of work related to Agenda 21. Additional studies have also been launched concerning the relationship between environment, sustainable development and employment in both developed and developing countries.
Food-related operational activities
47. The ILO's technical and normative inputs into WFP-assisted programmes are particularly useful in that hundreds of thousands of workers benefit from improved project execution and better working and living conditions. Concrete operational examples include the ILO/WFP Rehabilitation and Flood Damaged Rural Infrastructure and Agricultural Lands Project in Nepal, entirely funded by the Dutch Quality Improvement Fund and UNDP/ILO projects on vocational training in Jamaica.
48. Other recent developments include the utilization of WFP resources in ILO activities. There is an increasing number of ILO/WFP "food-for-work" (labour-intensive, special public works, community development and employment generation) projects, such as those in Cambodia and Mozambique; and "food-for-training" projects, particularly for demobilized soldiers, also in Mozambique, which is likely in the near future also to cover Angola.
IV. Direct support to employers' and workers' organizations
Support to employers' organizations
49. The total resources available for employers' activities in 1995 rose with the increase in approvals for externally funded technical cooperation projects. DANIDA continued to be the largest contributor to the programme, followed by the Government of Norway. The Government of Spain also approved a new project in 1995 to assist employers' organizations in the Andean subregion, while the Government of the Netherlands continued to support the programme of assistance in Eastern Europe (see box below). In carrying out this work, the specialists on employers' activities in the multidisciplinary advisory teams have a key role to play: they are in constant touch with employer constituents, and provide an essential link between them and ILO headquarters. They help ILO activities (including the design of multi-bilateral projects) to match the needs of each organization, and supervise the delivery of assistance. They also contribute through the provision of technical advisory services. Their direct contact with ILO headquarters also helps ensure a coherent tripartite basis for all ILO activities.
50. The task of this programme is to help employers' organizations in developing countries and in countries in transition to strengthen themselves by providing services relevant to the problems faced by their affiliated organizations. Such services range from representation at various levels of policy-making to action to solve problems and improve performance at the enterprise level. The types of assistance provided by this programme therefore reflect the kinds of pressure faced by enterprises in a rapidly changing world in a context of increasing competition and liberalization.
51. The role of employers' organizations is also undergoing change. A major meeting of Latin American employers (Lima, July 1995) considered the globalization of the world economy and its impact on the role of employers' organizations. Chilean employers examined the labour aspects of the internationalization of their economy, and proceeded to draw the consequences for their organization. The ILO also supported a national seminar in Uruguay on new forms of enterprise management and industrial relations.
52. Remuneration, and its link to job performance, was a subject on which several requests for assistance were received. Workshops on pay systems based on performance and skills were held in Papua New Guinea and Fiji in 1995. In Sri Lanka and the Philippines seminars were organized to examine productivity-linked pay systems. The Seventh ILO Round Table for Caribbean Employers (Roseau, April 1996) discussed progress in the subregional productivity initiative they had initiated at a previous session.
53. Enterprises all over the world recognize human resource development as critical to business success. Human resource development and industrial relations in a changing global environment were examined at a seminar held in Mongolia in April 1996. Industrial relations seminars were held in the Seychelles and Uruguay in 1995. In Pakistan, trainers from enterprises all over the country were trained in human resources development issues in 1996. Projects financed by Denmark and Norway in Asia and Africa are currently developing training materials for human resources development, based on a study of experience in a number of enterprises in those regions.
54. Employers' organizations in Jamaica, Uruguay and Qatar received assistance in their small enterprise-related activities. In Africa, a DANIDA-funded project assisted employers' organizations in six countries to develop their ability to provide training to small entrepreneurs. Assistance in the field of safety and health was provided in the Czech Republic and Pakistan, while the Indonesian employers' association was given a WISE training programme (Work Improvement in Small Enterprises).
55. One of the most significant developments in 1995 was the launch of a programme to encourage strategic planning by employers' organizations. This consisted in studying trends in the business environment of enterprises in order to plan the development of employers' organizations in the short to medium term, and thus ensure their continued relevance and usefulness to their membership. A workshop was organized for Asian employers at the Turin Centre to introduce and refine the concept of strategic planning; similar exercises will be conducted in other regions. This approach will help to focus the ILO's technical cooperation activities and enhance their sustainability.
| Supporting the process of change in countries in transition |
|
One of the most important roles of employers' organizations is to make the operating environment of enterprises easier to work in. This facilitates improvements in performance, and thus produces the conditions necessary for employment creation and income generation. While this is clearly important in every country, it is of critical importance in the context of major political and economic change.
In May 1995 the ILO organized a round table for employers' organizations from countries in Eastern Europe, the CIS countries and Mongolia. With the participation of resource persons of experienced employer representatives from Western Europe and the International Organization of Employers, the round table examined questions such as the establishment and functioning of voluntary employers' organizations in a market economy; adapting the legislative framework to promote entrepreneurship; and the role of tripartite dialogue in fostering the stability needed to attract investment. Based on the national experience of participants and advice from the resource persons, a set of conclusions were drawn up, which guide technical cooperation activities in the countries concerned. The ILO will also conduct such activities through projects financed by DANIDA and the Government of the Netherlands. |
56. Finally the programmes continued to extend assistance to the Federation of the Palestine Chamber of Commerce and draw Palestinian employer representatives into activities of direct interest to them, such as a study tour (1996) for employers' organizations in the Mediterranean basin organized jointly with the IOE.
Support to workers' organizations
57. Independent and representative workers' organizations are essential for the promotion of democracy, human rights and the protection of the weakest members of the society. Thus the main emphasis of this programme in the 1995-96 period was to promote and strengthen trade unions and to enhance their capacity to participate effectively in tripartite dialogue. In particular, the programme has sought to help workers' organizations cope with the many challenges arising from globalization, internationalization and the fragmentation of production patterns, privatization, changes in the structure of the labour market, the increase in the number of workers in the informal sector, and the introduction of new technology and forms of work organization.
58. In response to regional and subregional economic integration processes, often compounded with structural adjustment programmes, national and regional trade union organizations are attempting to influence the policy of the emerging economic and trade entities. Assistance has been provided to trade unions in Latin America involved in discussions with governments and employers with regard to the employment and related social impact of the economic and trade integration in MERCOSUR countries and in the Andean countries, where trade unions have pressed for the establishment of a social charter. In Africa, trade unions involved in similar efforts have been assisted in research activities, information sharing and the coordination of inter-union action on matters of mutual interest.
59. Enhancing the capability of workers' organizations to promote and defend human and trade union rights, as set out in international labour standards, and fostering their active participation in ILO standard-setting activities and supervisory mechanisms, has continued to play an important role in technical cooperation activities. Thus, a number of national seminars on industrial relations and international labour standards have been implemented in Asian countries as follow-up on previous regional activities. In Latin America, two subregional projects focused on rural workers' rights and on work in free trade zones.
60. Strengthening the planning, administration and execution of workers' education programmes involved 18 substantial technical cooperation projects. The subject areas covered included basic trade union training, collective bargaining, workers' education, institution building, occupational safety and health, environmental issues, trade unions and women, child labour, rural workers, workers' rights in free trade zones, and the inclusion of specialized training topics in workers' education programmes. While most projects were implemented at the national and subregional levels, two projects provided training on advanced and specialized topics at the interregional level.
61. In addition to training activities provided within the overall framework of projects, a number of seminars and courses on a variety of subjects pertaining to acute problems and challenges facing trade unions were organized. Study grants and fellowships enabled more than 600 trade union leaders and trainers from developing countries and from Central and Eastern Europe to participate, either on an individual basis or in groups, in training activities organized by international trade unions organizations and workers' education institutions.
| The promotion of trade unionism in Central and Eastern Europe |
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Trade unions are an inherent part of the changing societies of Central and Eastern Europe. Since 1993 the Bureau for Workers' Activities has operated a project, funded by the Netherlands, designed to support the development of democratic, independent and representative trade unions in the region.
In order to relate the activities as closely as possible to the needs of the cooperating trade unions, actual execution of the project is carried out by the workers' specialist in the ILO multidisciplinary team based in Budapest. The main thrust of the project has been to provide advice and information on how to gather, organize and disseminate the necessary data enabling trade unions to genuinely represent their members' interests. The most important areas were collective bargaining, privatization, occupational safety and health, and European integration. The project initiated over 50 seminars, eight of them regional. A survey was conducted of 3,200 trade unionists to assess their experience and needs in collective bargaining in five countries. The results will help trade unions' collective bargaining activities and guide international organizations in promoting cooperation. |
V. Trends in activities in different regions
Africa
62.Expenditure on technical cooperation in Africa in 1995, at close to 38 per cent of the total, again meant that the African programme was the largest of the ILO's regional programmes, albeit with a reduced share compared to 1994. Overall expenditure compared with 1994 declined by 8.8 per cent ($42.5 million, from $46.6 million). Multi-bilateral and trust funds overtook the UNDP as the single largest source of funding. The distribution of expenditure by programme remained stable, with support to development policies and enterprise development representing more than 64 per cent of the total. One innovative aspect was the support given to the creation of employment and training observatories (see box).
63. The significance of the African programme may also be gauged from the fact that ten country-level programmes accounted for more than $1 million in 1995 alone, with two (Madagascar and the United Republic of Tanzania) involving more than $3 million each. The size of the regional programmes was also substantial: nearly $10 million. Finally, of a total of over $34 million (see Appendix V) spent on LDCs, nearly $25 million were spent in the 32 in Africa.
| Employment and training observatories |
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At a time when the central interest in the region is employment creation, a majority of African countries lack basic information systems to facilitate the planning, design and implementation of policies and programmes for employment promotion. Employment and related training data are either non-existent or, more generally, highly unreliable. Where data exists it is usually dispersed over such a wide range of unrelated sources, hindering efficient collection and processing, and thus the possibility of systematic analysis or effective exploitation.
Aware of this fundamental obstacle to employment planning, member States have been requesting ILO assistance to establish employment and training observatories. Concerted efforts are under way which bring together MDTs, a number of headquarters technical units and several donors to respond to these requests. In certain cases, donors such as the World Bank and the UNDP have solicited ILO assistance for the creation of such observatories as components in support of larger employment programmes to increase the latter's relevance and effectiveness. So far, the ILO has provided assistance in the establishment of such observatories in Cte d'Ivoire and Mali (both with the World Bank). In Benin, where an observatory already exists, a support programme is being formulated with the collaboration of both the World Bank and the UNDP. In other countries, such as Cameroon, Chad and Gabon, employment and training observatories have been set up as part of operational technical cooperation projects, while in others, such as Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Guinea, Mauritania and Senegal, there are plans to set them up. A project is also under design to set up observatories in Portuguese-speaking African countries, with Portuguese funding support. The observatories provide a forum for the integration of contributions by various actors in the employment planning process: social partners, development partners, and beneficiaries. Such actors include various departments and centres within the ILO and externally, universities, research institutions, specialized training institutions and various international donors and technical cooperation organizations. To strengthen capacity building and sustainability, the observatories largely depend on available national human resources. |
64. Increased cooperation between the ILO and regional and subregional organizations remained an important objective of the regional programme. In this connection, a number of OAU activities, such as the Intra-African Labour Migration Seminar (Cairo, 1995) benefited from ILO financial and technical support. The ILO also continued to service sessions of the OAU Labour Commission, as well as other labour and employment-related technical meetings and activities. Within the United Nations common system, the ILO actively participated in the Inter-Agency Task Force on African Economic Recovery and Development in order to contribute to the formulation of the System-wide Special Initiative on Africa launched by the UN Secretary-General in March 1996. At the subregional level, the ILO continued to provide support to member States in areas of its competence, for example through the Consultative Conference of the Southern African Development Community of February 1996, which for the first time included an Employment and Labour Sector as a replacement of the now disbanded Southern African Labour Commission.
65. As in the past, regional centres assisted by the ILO, such as ARLAC, CRADAT and CIADFOR, continued to provide training, advisory services and other technical support to member States in matters related to labour administration and human resources development, with a view in particular to responding to changing needs in the regulatory environments.
Asia and the Pacific
66. Technical cooperation expenditure in the region in 1995 totalled $28.3 million, about the same level as in 1994 ($28.7 million). Expenditure on training activities amounted to $3.1 million, while employment activities accounted for $2.5 million, and management and small enterprise development $1.9 million.
67. In 1995 half of the region's technical cooperation programme was funded by multi-bilateral donors. The Government of Japan continued to provide substantial support in the fields of employment promotion and human resources development, industrial relations, labour administration, international labour standards, vocational rehabilitation and women workers. Other major donors included the Government of Germany (for the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour), the Governments of Norway, the Netherlands and Australia (Australian Support for ILO Objectives in Asia: ASILO), and the World Bank.
68. Technical cooperation activities in the region in pursuance of these basic objectives emphasized support to national efforts designed to implement employment promotion and poverty alleviation policies and strategies. At the regional level, the three MDTs in the region collaborated in the implementation of a major component of the UNDP-funded regional poverty alleviation programme executed by the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS). The ILO component is designed to sensitize high-level policy-makers from ten Asian countries (see box).
| Alleviating poverty in Asia: In search of macroeconomic policies |
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Asia accounts for the bulk of the world's poor and, not surprisingly, poverty alleviation has been and remains a major concern in large parts of the continent. In the past governments have relied mainly on micro-level interventions, such as special employment schemes for poverty alleviation. But recent experience with stabilization and structural adjustment policies has highlighted the relevance of macroeconomic policies; it is now recognized that macroeconomic policies pursued in the past must have had effects on poverty, perhaps even on the effectiveness of micro-level interventions, though these were not always identified or analysed.
The effects of micro-level interventions and macroeconomic policies varied a great deal between countries. An analysis of experience in different countries, therefore, should help identify policies and measures that have proved highly effective in alleviating poverty. This is the premise on which the ILO's ongoing project on "Macroeconomic policies, micro-level interventions and poverty alleviation in Asia" is based. The project is one component of a larger UNDP-funded project on the "Regional Poverty Alleviation Programme for Asia and the Pacific". The executing agency for this larger project is the UNDP's Office for Project Services in Kuala Lumpur. Activities under the ILO project involve preparation of ten case-studies (Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines and Thailand) on the theme "Macroeconomic policies and poverty alleviation", five case- studies (Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia and the Philippines) on the theme "Micro-level interventions and poverty alleviation" and two synthesis studies on the two themes and the organization of a regional workshop. The investigative studies will place particular emphasis on issues relating to "women and poverty". The central objectives are to identify the policies and programmes that are most appropriate for poverty alleviation in Asian countries and to assist top-level policy-makers in implementing these policies and programmes. The ILO's South Asia Multidisciplinary Advisory Team (SAAT), in Delhi, has the overall responsibility for implementation of the project in which the multidisciplinary teams in Bangkok and Manila are also involved. |
69. Relations with the donor community designed to augment and diversify extra-budgetary sources for technical cooperation benefited from a joint mission aimed at promoting technical cooperation between the ILO and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Manila. As a result the ILO was short-listed for bids for a number of technical assistance projects to be funded by the ADB. The ILO has been approached to implement the ILO/ADB Regional Technical Assistance on "Cooperation in Employment Promotion and Training in the Greater Mekong Subregion". Arrangements have also been made with the ADB to explore closer cooperation between the two organizations outside the framework of bids and implementation of loans, especially through joint activities. This has obvious advantages for the ILO in terms of upstream influence on national programmes supported by large-scale loan activities, as well as putting the ILO in a favourable position for subsequent bids, and allows it to interest the World Bank, multi-bilateral donors and possibly the UNDP in co-financing arrangements. The scope for ILO/IMF cooperation has thus far been limited to those offices and MDTs that have enjoyed traditional dialogue with the IMF in areas of common concern. Field offices have been encouraged to review and foster ILO/IMF collaboration systematically. This will be closely monitored by the Regional Office and headquarters.
70. Although the volume of ILO/UNDP technical cooperation programmes has been declining over the past few years, the level of approvals for technical support services at programme level (TSS-1) and at project level (TSS-2) remains satisfactory. Efforts have been made to strengthen ILO/UNDP relations and collaboration at the field level. As follow-up on to the World Social Summit, the UNDP's Sixth Programming Cycle has placed great emphasis on poverty alleviation. This could open up new opportunities to increase the volume of ILO activities under UNDP programmes, both national and regional, within the next few years.
71. As regards the promotion of tripartism, the main objectives of ILO operational programmes were to improve the technical knowledge and capability of the leaders of trade unions and employers' associations and to strengthen their organizational capacity. Technical support services were provided to workers' organizations on social and human rights and on developing skills to respond to changes in the competitive market. A number of workers' activities were undertaken on international labour standards. The support provided covered issues such as industrial relations, wage policies and trade union rights. Training seminars were organized on such topics as women's access to trade union membership, tripartism and occupational safety and health.
Latin America and the Caribbean
72. Total expenditure on technical cooperation for the Latin American region in 1995 reached $12.5 million, or 11 per cent of total ILO expenditure. This represents a nearly 12 per cent decrease compared to the previous year. New approvals, however, have grown to $26.4 million, in large part due to a contribution from the IPEC programme. At the same time, other traditional donors also registered an increase in approvals.
73. Efforts concentrated on the identification and formulation of projects within five regional priorities, as stated in the Programme and Budget for 1996-97. New programmes and projects approved in 1995 covered the development of occupational safety and health in the process of economic integration and globalization, IPEC, the strengthening of social dialogue, and private sector development through employers' organizations -- all financed by the Government of Spain. Furthermore, the EU is financing a project on the strengthening and modernization of trade unions, and is currently considering other proposals for the MERCOSUR countries. The German Government approved a project worth $1.7 million, aimed at creating a new database for research, information and management of vocational training, as well as providing institutional support to CINTERFOR.
74. RBTC resources amounting to $1.9 million in 1995-96 were devoted mainly to country objectives and have been used for promoting such regional priorities as employment, working conditions, social protection, democracy and international labour standards, medium and small enterprise activities, and child labour. Training seminars and workshops for constituents were organized on the relation between technical cooperation and standards, and on the use of the CD-ROM information tools, NATLEX and ILOLEX, resulting in 150 officers from government institutions, trade unions and employers' organizations using these instruments and able to produce feedback material. Some 110 officials from legislative bodies, universities and other academic circles were also trained to use these information tools.
75. To assist in the process of economic adjustment, ILO support was given to the promotion of tripartism and social dialogue. Special emphasis was placed on the strengthening of tripartite consultative bodies through sponsorship or participation in meetings focusing on this issue, acting as the technical secretariat for tripartite commissions, and negotiating new projects. The Regional Office published an important report, "1995 Labour Overview", which was enthusiastically received in the region. The report concluded that 1995 was, on balance, the "year of fragile economies with a setback in employment".
76. The ongoing peace process in Central America draws on the ILO's services to modernize labour ministries, strengthen employers' and workers' organizations and generally promote tripartism. In this context, special emphasis was placed on the negotiation of the peace settlement in Guatemala, in which the ILO participated at the request of the parties involved and of the Secretary-General of the United Nations. International labour standards have played a new role as a substantive basis for the peace agreements. The Agreement on the Identity and Rights of Indigenous Peoples is based on the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989 (No. 169), and the Government of Guatemala has fulfilled its obligation under this peace agreement to ratify the Convention. The Agreement on Socio-Economic Matters and Agrarian Reform covers a great many ILO Conventions in its substantive provisions. As a result of the predominance of ILO instruments in the peace accords, the ILO has been asked to assume a significant role in the verification of their implementation and in technical cooperation for the consolidation of the peace process.
Figure 7. Latin America and the Caribbean -- Expenditure by source of funds
77. In 1995, the ILO organized 104 national meetings, 16 subregional seminars and 18 regional events. The ILO was represented at 290 meetings organized by other entities; 484 missions (technical advisory services, assistance and participation in meetings, formulation of national objectives) were undertaken in the region, while 82 missions were filled by headquarters to the Americas region. The number of fellowships granted in cooperation with the Turin Centre was 47 for courses within the region and 26 for seminars organized at the Turin Centre.
78. The country objectives exercise increasingly generated a positive response from ILO constituents and ensured their active participation in the implementation of the agreed priority activities; in some cases they have also made cash contributions. Other donors have in a number of cases shown interest in pursuing objectives defined in the ILO-led country objectives process.
| Ministries of labour in a new socio-economic context: |
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The tendency to reduce regulation of the labour market and enhance autonomy for direct negotiations between employers and employees has promoted significant modifications in the traditional functions of labour ministries. Another contributing factor was privatization and the contracting out of certain public services. In this changing context, the objectives of the ILO research project on the modernization of ministries of labour are (i) to develop innovative strategies on the new roles and responsibilities of the ministry of labour; (ii) to submit these strategies for analysis and comment to a selected group of ministers and representatives of employers and workers; and (iii) to publish and distribute the findings of the study.
Growing empirical evidence points to the new roles ministries of labour play in strengthening direct negotiations on an ever wider canvass of issues. Of special interest are those designed to have an impact, for example, on vocational training, including the training of disadvantaged groups, productivity and minimum wage legislation. These will supplement the "conventional" contribution of the ministers to promoting active employment policy, special employment schemes -- to mention but a few. It is similarly expected that Ministers of Labour will play an increasingly significant role in linking economic policies with social priorities. To achieve this objective they will have to intensify dialogue, consultation and cooperation with representatives of employers' and workers' organizations. The contribution of the Labour Ministry will be concentrated on: (i) active employment policies; (ii) the elaboration of labour policies coherent with the proposed economic strategy; and (iii) the design and application of social security. |
Arab States of the Middle East
79. The technical cooperation programme in the Arab States in the Middle East was considerably strengthened, in size and scope, during the period under review. Particular efforts were made to ensure the timely provision of appropriate assistance to ILO constituents in two critical fields: human resources development and employment promotion. All activities benefited from the Arab States Multidisciplinary Advisory Team (ARMAT) whose role and visibility have greatly increased.
80. Total expenditure on technical cooperation activities in 1995 nearly doubled to $2.6 million, compared with $1.4 million in 1994. This reflects the Office's intensified efforts to ensure the timely delivery of project inputs, in particular under newly approved projects. UNDP continued to be the single largest source, accounting for more than 50 per cent of total expenditure. However, the share of trust-fund projects in total expenditure increased significantly, to 21.7 per cent in 1995 from 8.9 per cent in 1994.
81. Approvals of new projects also increased markedly, from $1.2 million in 1994 to $4.5 million in 1995. In addition to funds from UNDP, those from the Ruler of Sharjah (United Arab Emirates), Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, and the Governments of Italy and Kuwait contributed to improvements in the approval level.
82. The Office maintained close cooperation with the Arab Labour Organization (ALO), which shares with the ILO common responsibilities and concerns through its tripartite structure. Within the framework of the 1994-95 ILO/ALO joint programme, four regional seminars and export meetings were held. These dealt with international and Arab labour standards, women's employment (see box), vocational training and vocational rehabilitation. The two organizations also collaborated in the translation of ILO publications into Arabic and in the implementation of two UNDP-funded regional programmes, one on labour administration and the other on support to migration policies.
83. The Office also further strengthened relations with other regional organizations, including the International Confederation of Arab Trade Unions (ICATU), the General Union of the Chambers of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture of Arab Countries, and the Executive Bureau of the Council of Ministers of Labour and Social Affairs in Gulf Cooperation Council States.
84. Collaboration with the Arab Gulf Programme for United Nations Development Organizations (AGFUND), the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development (AFESD) and the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) was also promoted. In particular, the ILO and AGFUND agreed in principle on joint activities concerning the elimination of child labour.
85. At the regional and subregional levels, the Office continued to implement the Regional Arab Programme for Labour Administration (ILO/UNDP/ALO) on support to migration policies in Arab labour-sending countries (ILO/UNDP/AGFUND) and on the promotion of community-based rehabilitation services in Gulf countries (ILO/AGFUND). These activities focused in particular on training in the respective technical fields.
Figure 8. Arab States, Middle East -- Expenditure by source of funds
Support to the Palestinian Authority
86. Intensified efforts focused on the pressing needs of the labour force in Gaza and the West Bank. The special allocation ($900,000) for 1994-95 was used to support the new Department of Labour and Vocational Training and employers' and workers' organizations. These activities emphasized staff capacities, improving office equipment and providing policy advice. In response to additional requests, the Office supported activities concerned with labour statistics, labour inspection, a labour code, small enterprise development, the rehabilitation of ex-detainees and employment promotion. Technical assistance to workers' and employers' organizations was an important feature. As regards activities for employers, the project on capacity building for the Federation of the Palestine Chambers of Commerce continued. Workers' organizations benefited from training in the organization of workers' education programmes.
87. With extra-budgetary resources, the ILO continued to implement a project on the establishment of a model production workshop manufacturing low-cost wheelchairs and employing disabled workers in Gaza and the West Bank. During the period under review, the ILO project proposals on the rehabilitation of ex-detainees, the training of contractors and the establishment of a vocational rehabilitation centre were approved by donors, and the necessary arrangements were made to launch the project activities. Preparations were completed for the project on income-generation activities for disabled persons.
| Regional seminar on Arab women and work |
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A regional seminar was organized, jointly with the Arab Labour Organization (ALO), within the framework of the programme of joint ILO/ALO activities for 1994-95. Its purpose was to seek a common Arab position on women and work, to be presented at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, September 1995.
It provided a forum for raising issues such as the legal issues affecting working women in Arab countries, including international and Arab labour standards, as well as for proposing solutions enabling women to achieve equality of treatment. The tripartite seminar was successful in bringing together government, employers' and workers' representatives, as well as other national and international experts, and enabled the participants to freely discuss problems and experience relating to women and work in the Arab region. It highlighted the diverse needs of the participating countries: the creation of a regional committee of women for the Arab region, a review of legal provisions, the collection of statistical data for the dissemination of reliable information, the setting up of micro-enterprises by women and the promotion of technical training programmes. Following this seminar, in collaboration with the Centre of Arab Women for Training and Research (CAWTAR) and the Arab Labour Organization (ALO), the ILO presented to the Fourth World Conference on Women a paper entitled "Women and work in the Arab region: A perspective". |
Europe
88. In 1995 operational activities grew quite considerably. In expenditure terms the growth, as compared with the previous year, was 41.4 per cent. Some 23 countries from Eastern Europe and the central Asian and Transcaucasian republics were served by the programme. The increase derived mainly from multi-bilateral resources, with the UNDP share amounting to nearly $1 million, out of a total expenditure of $8.8 million.
89. Consultancies carried out in response to specific requests formed an important part of the programme; these were planned and carried out by the Budapest team, drawing on headquarters' specialists on a case-by-case basis; support on issues connected with the promotion or application of international labour standards was consistently provided with consultancies fielded from headquarters.
90. Operational projects were in progress in a number of countries, including Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Turkey, the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Lithuania. These had a strong reliance on nationally available expertise and talent. This was highlighted at the Fifth European Conference held in Warsaw in September 1995. Most projects addressed issues concerned with labour legislation, labour administration, social security, labour statistics, labour market reforms, small-scale enterprise development, wage policies and the strengthening of workers' and employers' organizations. It became clear that the demand for support, particularly from countries seeking admission to the EU, by far outstripped the available resources, hence a vigorous resource mobilization effort was maintained to generate additional means of responding to countries' needs.
91. In addition to consultancies and national projects, other means of action included seminars, conferences and round tables, some on a regional or subregional basis in connection with labour inspection, the prevention of substance abuse (see box) and wage policies, with financial support from the EU -- the latter organized by the MDT in Budapest on a tripartite basis.
92. Also in 1995 the Office set in motion an important programme of technical assistance for the social reconstruction of Bosnia and Herzegovina, with external funding still being sought from various potential partners. The main emphasis of the future programme will concern employment promotion, the reconstruction of social institutions and the strengthening of tripartism. A small support cell is already operational in Sarajevo, funded by Luxembourg.
| Mobilizing enterprises and workers to prevent
substance abuse in Central and Eastern Europe |
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An innovative concept funded by the UN International Drug Control Programme, this three-year project aims at developing national capacity to design, implement and evaluate model workplace substance abuse prevention programmes in the six participating countries: Hungary, Latvia, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovenia and Ukraine.
Six enterprises will be selected in each country by a tripartite advisory board representing the Ministry of Labour and employers' and workers' organizations, in which comprehensive workplace programmes will be developed. These programmes consist in creating management awareness of substance abuse as a productivity issue, the integration of prevention into overall management responsibilities, policy formulation and communication, as well as a full range of prevention activities for all employees (information and education, self-assessment, training, health promotion). These programmes will be monitored and improved and subsequently made available for dissemination to all enterprises in the countries through employers' and workers' organizations and management and business circles. An additional output of the project is to create a resource centre in each country which will compile information on all available alcohol and drug services provided in the community. This centre aims to create the link between enterprises needing assistance for its employees and the counselling, treatment and rehabilitation resources already existing in the community. |
VI. Review of activities by technical programme
Employment and development
93. The major aim in the 1995-96 biennium was to assist ILO constituents in the design of economic policies and strategies for employment creation, ensuring sustainable and equitable economic growth and implementing efficient labour market intervention in the context of a globalized economy. The field structure and the MDT increasingly spearheaded ILO interventions at the country level, making ever greater use of TSS-1 and TSS-2 facilities, with support from headquarters determined on a case-by-case basis. The amount incurred in 1995 was nearly the same as in 1994: $64 million.
94. Several technical cooperation activities on economic restructuring and labour market policies were undertaken in 1995 and early 1996. An ILO review of the labour market impact of adjustment programmes in several African countries were examined by representatives of the social partners, donor governments, the Bretton Woods institutions, policy-makers and research bodies: it was concluded that employment policies with a poverty-reducing focus constituted an integral element of adjustment programmes (see box).
| Adjustment and labour markets in sub-Saharan Africa |
| A project has been documenting the impact on the labour market of adjustment programmes in Kenya, the United Republic of Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. National seminars brought together senior representatives of governments, social partners, bilateral and multilateral organizations, including the World Bank and IMF, as well as policy research and civil institutions. Countries expressed a keen interest in employment policies with a poverty-reducing focus as an integral element of adjustment programmes. Proposals for regular consultation between governments, trade unions and employers' organizations on the impact of adjustment on employment as a part of the budget cycle gained substantial support. Recommendations will be followed up at a high-level interregional seminar in Uganda. |
95. Another technical cooperation project on economic restructuring and employment adjustment in the context of the transition from a planned to a market economy in Kazakstan has enhanced the technical expertise of local administration, employment offices and vocational training centres in the planning and execution of labour market policies, as well as in providing impetus to small enterprise development.
96. The ILO's Maghreb programme involved senior-level authorities concerned with immigration and emigration countries (Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria) and aimed at reducing migration pressure. Analysis of the labour markets of the Maghreb countries, together with the forecasts on migration pressure, has been designed to assist cooperation policy formulation by European countries.
97. The self-evaluation of the technical cooperation project on technologies for rural employment creation in Bangladesh revealed tangible improvements in the self-organizational and self-management capacity of women's groups and a marked improvement in the orientation and skills of counterpart officials (Women's Affairs Department) in project planning and implementation.
Vocational training systems management
98. This programme, complementing the employment programme described above and since mid-1996 merged with it, has continued to place emphasis on improving the capacity of national vocational training systems in meeting labour market demand; involving the social partners in the design and management of vocational training systems; making training more cost-effective, particularly for the most vulnerable groups; and adopting new approaches to training delivery. The 1995 expenditure figure was among the leading programmes, involving more than $13 million.
99. A number of training projects have been implemented to help national training authorities to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of public training systems (Madagascar, Chad, Kuwait). Reorientation of public training towards the needs of the informal sector through community-based training approaches has been continued. The ILO methodology for community-based training has been introduced in some CIS countries and Poland.
100. Skills and entrepreneurship training for countries emerging from armed conflict (see box) has been promoted by the ILO over the last few years, and a number of programmes covering employment-intensive works, micro- and small enterprise development, credit schemes and skills and business training were developed for populations affected by war in Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, Nicaragua and Mozambique.
| Socio-economic reintegration of populations affected by war |
|
The situation in post-conflict countries is usually dominated by high unemployment and low labour absorption capacity of the formal sector. Large sections of the population are displaced or demobilized from the army; they, as well as the people who remained resident, have often lost their means of livelihood and assets. Conventional solutions proposed by technical cooperation are not always applicable in the face of limited national capacities and the large numbers of people affected. Action is needed at short notice to geographically dispersed populations and under considerable time pressure.
In the past few years, the ILO has been involved in a growing number of programmes for such populations, covering employment-intensive works, micro- and small enterprise development, credit schemes and skills and business training. The countries concerned include Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, Honduras, Nicaragua and Mozambique. In 1994-95, the ILO undertook a number of studies relating to one of the top-priority groups for post-conflict countries: demobilized combatants. These were presented to an African regional expert meeting in July 1995, the outcome of which was a Framework of guidelines for the reintegration of demobilized combatants through training and employment, widely circulated to potential users worldwide. In the 1996-97 biennium, the ILO is enlarging this exercise to cover other war-affected groups: returning refugees, internally displaced and severely war-affected communities. Developing adequate employment-related reintegration programmes and ensuring that they reach the most needy is a major challenge. The ILO action programme on skills and entrepreneurship training for countries emerging from armed conflict will produce guidelines and orientation courses for the ILO constituents involved in the implementation of programmes for the social and economic reintegration of populations affected by war. |
101. Activities on the development of flexible and relevant methodologies for the training and retraining of workers, including redundant workers, have been intensified. Assistance was provided to the Russian Federation, Poland, Ukraine and Belarus in the development of modular training programmes following the ILO's Modules of Employable Skills (MES) approach. In support of competency-based training, the ILO is establishing an international network of modular training providers.
102. One of the continuing main objectives of ILO technical cooperation in the field of vocational rehabilitation is to assist countries towards ratification and implementation of the Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (Disabled Persons) Convention, 1983 (No. 159). The programme implemented some 20 national and regional technical cooperation projects, including ten projects on the prevention of drug and alcohol problems at the workplace. Two tripartite regional (Caribbean, southern Africa) seminars were also organized, in cooperation with MDTs, to promote increased training and employment opportunities for persons with disabilities, through the formulation of national policy and legislation.
Support to development policies
103. The programme aims to strengthen the capacity of constituents in developing countries to develop and implement job creation programmes, focusing on the rural and urban informal sectors, women and disadvantaged social groups, and population and human resources planning. As Appendix I (C) shows, in 1996 for the first time this programme was the largest, incurring well over $24 million.
104. The job demand for employment-intensive works programmes in the context of job creation and poverty alleviation, as reflected in many ILO country objective statements, continues to be high. At the end of 1995, technical assistance programmes were operational in over 30 countries. The employment-intensive programme of the ILO, in the meantime, has emphasized a multidisciplinary approach to investment policy at the macro level, and private sector development, community participation, training and institution building at the project level (see box). This approach has enabled the ILO to maintain a leading role and respond to requests for ILO interventions in the reorientation of World Bank-funded social funds in West Africa. The programme has also been increasingly concerned with private sector involvement in employment-intensive public investment projects in the infrastructure sector. It seeks constantly to explore ways and means by which the social partners may be more effectively involved in efforts to improve working conditions and to apply relevant ILO standards.
| Employment generation in Cambodia |
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Since mid-1992, the ILO has assisted the Royal Government of Cambodia in developing and implementing a national Employment Generation Programme. The Programme comprises three components: employment-intensive rehabilitation and maintenance, small enterprise and informal sector promotion, and vocational training for employment. ILO assistance focuses on the development of systems and procedures and the provision of training to generate direct employment and to upgrade skills of workers and entrepreneurs. During the first three years of its implementation, the programme reached some 11,000 beneficiaries, including important target groups such as women, the rural poor, demobilized soldiers, returnees from refugee camps and internally displaced persons.
Its principal achievements include the generation of over 1,500,000 workdays of direct employment through the construction/rehabilitation of secondary road and irrigation canals and extensive clean-up and maintenance works at the World Heritage Site of Angkor, and the establishment of labour-based road and irrigation maintenance systems. Over 3,500 people (60 per cent women) were trained in small business development and management, and over 2,300 of them started or expanded businesses. In addition, over 4,100 women were provided with credit for micro enterprises. The ILO recently developed an action programme on skills and entrepreneurship training for countries emerging from armed conflict. The main priority for this programme will be to enhance the national capacity to formulate, implement and monitor employment policies and human resource development policies and programmes. The promotion of basic workers' rights and the strengthening of labour institutions will be an important part of the overall process, with particular concern for women, disabled persons and children. Sources of funding for the programme's expansion are likely to include the Asian Development Bank, the EU, the Governments of the Netherlands and Sweden, UNDP and the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF). |
105. Against the backdrop of rapid urbanization and the growth of the urban informal economy, urban employment has become a growing challenge for technical cooperation. The ILO has developed a two-pronged strategy to address this challenge based on programmes for the employment-intensive upgrading of informal settlements and for informal sector development. With support from the Government of Italy and RBTC, the ILO was actively involved in preparations for the Second United Nations Conference on Human Settlements -- Habitat II (Istanbul)(8) including the organization of an International Symposium on the Future of Urban Employment and a major thematic dialogue on employment during the Habitat II Conference itself (1995). With support from the UNDP and the Governments of Denmark, Belgium and Italy, the ILO has developed and supported the implementation of urban employment programmes and undertaken policy advisory and training activities targeted at the municipal and local levels in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and in Latin America.
106. The Programme on Women's Employment Promotion has continued to provide support to ILO member countries through innovative pilot projects and policy advice aimed at enhancing social protection and promoting employment and income-generating activities for poor women in the rural and informal sectors. The Programme has addressed two main issues: home work in the global context and the impact of structural adjustment on women's employment, income and working conditions.
107. Within the framework of assistance to homeworkers, an exploratory study on home work has been initiated in Latin America, which will serve as a basis for future action. Guidelines are being prepared, based on the experience in projects implemented in Thailand and the Philippines. Such projects have led to the establishment of a national network of homeworkers in the Philippines and an association in Thailand. With regard to the impact of structural adjustment policies and economic reform on women's employment, a tripartite national policy workshop was held in 1995, and impact assessment studies are being undertaken in Sri Lanka and India, where a national network and a national tripartite advisory committee were established. In Africa, support has been provided to the development of a pilot income-generation credit scheme in the United Republic of Tanzania and to a major national programme on gender mainstreaming in Nigeria.
108. The subprogramme directed at indigenous and tribal peoples continued to promote dialogue, through policy workshops and seminars, among such peoples, governments and interested social parties on a broad range of issues, including land and national resources rights, mechanisms for enhanced participation in decision-making and large-scale development projects. In the Philippines, the Bureau of Rural Workers (BRW) of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), following an ILO/DOLE house training workshop on Convention No. 169, is now preparing a service of consultations with indigenous communities on the integration of programmes for indigenous workers within the BRW's ongoing activities. In response to requests from governments, indigenous organizations, trade unions and support groups, a guide on the scope, application and influence of Convention No. 169 was updated, expanded and published with the financial support of a Canadian NGO. As part of the capacity-building effort to enable indigenous and tribal peoples to negotiate fair and culturally appropriate conditions with the public and private sectors, a handbook on effective bargaining in development has been published.
109. The labour and population subprogramme continues to introduce measures to enhance the capacity of constituents to address population, poverty and sustainable human development issues. Direct support to ILO constituents for educational programmes for workers, as well as assistance for national population policy formulation and implementation, was provided in 40 countries through 61 technical cooperation projects. The programme also provided support to governmental and non-governmental organizations (including cooperatives) for women in 20 countries. An important ILO-sponsored workshop held in Accra in pursuance of the International Conference on Population and Development (Cairo 1994) brought together trade union leaders from 30 African countries to discuss ways and means of enhancing the capacity of the organized sector to shape national population policies. A plan of action was adopted, which outlined what trade unions expect of governments and employers' organizations.
Enterprise and cooperative development
110. The main objective of the technical cooperation activities undertaken by this major programme is to enhance the capacity of constituents to design and implement effective policies and programmes that promote and facilitate the creation of sustainable quality jobs in enterprises and cooperatives, both in the formal and informal sectors and in urban and rural areas. Although direct expenditure on traditional projects backstopped by the major programme continued to fall as a result of the increase in national execution, this was to a large extent compensated for by a considerable increase in TSS-1 and TSS-2 activities. The backstopping of new projects was also gradually being taken over by the MDTs. Demand for advisory services was constrained by insufficient funding.
111. Countries emerging from armed conflict (Mozambique and Angola, and preparatory activities under way in Bosnia, Liberia, Mali, Niger and Somalia) received special attention. The approach followed was based on earlier successful experience in Cambodia and Central America, where the ILO helped establish local economic development agencies consisting of local government bodies, NGOs, private sector actors, and employers' and workers' representatives, to promote employment creation through the identification of economic opportunities and the promotion of enterprise development. This approach proved cost-effective and sustainable, since many of the agencies became financially self-supporting by acting as intermediaries in their own right, channelling development bank funds and providing credit to micro and small enterprises.
112. The major programme also continued to implement a number of national and interregional projects, mainly in Africa and Asia, emphasizing credit and finance, for example, through credit and savings cooperatives, village banks, collateral substitutes and guarantee funds. The ILO's work in this area has received increasing international recognition, as evidenced by the invitation to join the World Bank-supported Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest, which deals specifically with the issue of cost-effective credit delivery systems for the poorest elements of society.
113. As regards small enterprise development, the major programme provided policy advice with respect to an appropriate legal and regulatory environment, mainly through TSS-1 missions, in various countries including, among others, Egypt, Kyrgyzstan, Madagascar, Namibia and Pakistan. Technical cooperation activities in the context of the Improve Your Business/Start Your Business (IYB/SYB) programme expanded further, providing small entrepreneurs in all regions with training in basic business skills. Particularly significant in this respect was the start of an IYB/SYB project in South Africa, where 26 small enterprise-support organizations took part in a pilot phase, and another 50 organizations expressed interest in joining a second phase. IYB/SYB projects in the Arab region also expanded significantly. As part of its efforts to upgrade micro-enterprises in the informal sector, two interregional projects were pursued, aimed at improving productivity and working conditions in micro-enterprises in the fields of metalworking, food processing and building materials.
114. As regards management development, the major programme was particularly active in countries in transition such as Belarus (see box below), the Russian Federation and Ukraine. It also continued its efforts to strengthen management development in Africa. These projects aim at achieving institutional changes, which require solving complex issues. Their design, however, often fails to recognize the time dimension. If phasing out occurs too soon, the expectations created lead to frustration. To overcome this problem the ILO seeks the agreement of donors to finance projects of longer duration. Local counterparts also need to be made aware that such projects inevitably take longer to achieve their objectives.
| Belarus: Conversion of military bases |
| At the request of the Government of Belarus, the ILO undertook a project to convert military bases in the country into enterprise development zones. The project, which started at the end of 1994, pursued an integrated approach involving the ILO's tripartite constituents and the private sector. An intensive public information campaign was mounted to ensure that the project objectives were fully understood and supported by the local population. During the period under review the project helped create a number of small-scale pilot enterprises to demonstrate the feasibility of conversion. It also developed proposals to attract foreign investment. Other innovative aspects of the project were its almost complete reliance on local expertise and the emphasis on environmental issues. The project paid particular attention to the question of energy conservation by introducing more energy efficient methods and equipment. In 1995 the project was recognized by UNDP as one of the ten most successful projects in the area of sustainable human development. |
115. Since the end of 1995 responsibility for technical cooperation activities in the hotels and tourism sector was transferred to this major programme. During the period under review five major projects continued to be backstopped by the unit concerned. Particularly noteworthy was a regional project in Latin America which ended in early 1996, aimed at establishing national tripartite committees responsible for training and skills certification based on regional standards.
116. Technical cooperation activities in the field of cooperatives emphasized cooperative reform, cooperative training networking, cooperative support to indigenous and tribal peoples, poverty alleviation, cooperative trade and cooperative social services. With respect to the first three themes, funding was provided under the ILO/DANIDA programme. This multi-year programme strategy considerably facilitated programme planning and the mobilization of resources from other donors. The programme providing cooperative support to indigenous and tribal peoples (INDISCO) was particularly successful in this respect, and received additional funding from a variety of donors, including the Netherlands, the Canadian International Development Agency, RABO Bank, AGFUND and UNDP. The programme was active mainly in India and the Philippines, but recently started activities in Central America. Activities performed under the cooperative training networking programme, COOPNET, were considered a great success by an ILO/DANIDA evaluation in early 1996, which also confirmed that COOPNET activities had been instrumental in strengthening both the technical and institutional capacity of the participating cooperative training institutions.
Sectoral activities
117. The general objective of this major programme is to facilitate the exchange between constituents of information on labour and social developments relevant to particular economic sectors, and to complement it with practically oriented research on topical sectoral issues. Sector-specific technical cooperation is designed to promote improved conditions of work and to improve the capacity of those involved to deal equitably and effectively with social and labour issues in the sectors concerned.
Maritime activities
118. The pilot phase of the Port Worker Development Programme (PDP), financed by the Government of the Netherlands, was nearing the end of its pilot phase. An evaluation carried out jointly by the donor and the ILO has confirmed the high quality of the training materials prepared and tested by the project. A port training project financed by the Government of Norway has been completed in Mozambique. As part of the Transport and Communications Decade for Asia and the Pacific, a regional seminar on the social and labour effects of structural adjustment in the port industry of selected Asian and Pacific countries was held in Pattaya, Thailand, and a training course on occupational analyses for port officials was held in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Industrial activities
119. Advisory services and technical cooperation were concentrated in the forestry and plantations sector. A project in Zimbabwe successfully established a work study branch within the Zimbabwe Forestry Commission, which will also help private industry to introduce more efficient and safer work methods. A technology and training project in Pakistan developed and introduced new techniques that double productivity in afforestation works, increase earnings and reduce physical strain. The forestry and wood industries specialist completed an assignment with the MDT Santiago as coordinator of the interdepartmental "Environment and the World of Work" programme, which directly assisted national constituents, through six individual projects in mining, forestry, agriculture, environmental management and workers' education. A project to assist women fuel-wood carriers in Ethiopia is highlighted in the box below.
| Supporting women fuel-wood carriers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia |
| Well over 15,000 women in Addis Ababa alone support themselves and their families by carrying fuel-wood. They supply at least 35 per cent of the city's domestic energy needs. The collection and sale of fuel-wood is a survival strategy; it requires no skills or capital investment, only the women's labour, time and energy. Surveys found that these women belonged to the poorest section of society. Two-thirds of those interviewed depended entirely on fuel-wood collection and sale for their livelihood; yet it was estimated that to collect one load of fuel-wood, the women made a round trip of 30 km on average, and carried average loads of 30 kg on the return journey. Monthly earnings were below $12, but the majority of women (60 per cent) were the main contributors to their household's upkeep. The women are also among the least protected groups of workers in the country. Such women's activity is illegal, and they are subject to prosecution and often harassment by forest guards. Self-employed women workers have been singled out as a prime target group for ILO assistance by the Forestry and Wood Industries Committee, a priority also reflected in overall ILO policy and by the Ethiopian Government. Since 1994, the ILO's Industrial Activities Branch has been implementing a project jointly with the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs that aims at reconciling the basic needs of the women fuel-wood carriers with the sustainable management of forest resources. To attain this objective, the project draws on the ILO's competence in the forestry sector, the organization of women's groups, small industries development and credit. The two-tier strategy of the project aims at providing the women access to alternative sources of income through advice, credit and training and to integrate them into regular forest management. At the end of its first phase in early 1997, the project will have directly assisted some 400 women in Addis Ababa. These form the core of a National Fuel-wood Carriers' Association that will provide assistance as a self-help organization. A credit scheme designed and tested by the project is to be adopted as part of the World Bank-supported national household energy programme. A second phase of the project will cover all major urban centres in the country, and the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs intends to use the experience gained for its overall strategy concerning women and the informal sector. |
Salaried employees and professional workers
120. Technical advice and support to the South African Ministry of Public Service and Administration, the Public Service Commission, regional commissions and public service trade unions contributed significantly to the preparation of a white paper on public service transformation, the definition of a pay policy designed to reduce public sector wage inequalities, and to helping public sector workers achieve a common approach to public sector reorganization. Technical support through the Development of African Education Working Group on Teacher Management and Support made it possible for the provisions contained in ILO standards, backed up by references to documented best practices on educational personnel, to be incorporated in national policy studies on proposed legal and administrative changes in three English-speaking countries. The studies also served as a basis for country action by working groups.
Industrial relations and labour administration
Labour law and labour relations
121. Programmes and activities have been designed to suit different national conditions taking account of the broader interests of political stability, global trade, economic growth and social justice. The dynamic changes in many parts of the world, especially those relating to the democratization process, the shift to a market economy, and structural adjustment programmes, have clearly demonstrated the need to develop tripartite consensus and to prevent the burden of adjustment from falling disproportionately on the wage-earning sector. As such, the programmes and activities have been conceived and carried out to promote tripartite cooperation with the aim of protecting workers in accordance with ILO standards and to respond to the needs of employers and the State. In the areas of labour law and labour relations, these programmes and activities comprised three main subprogrammes: the revision of labour legislation, the strengthening of systems and practices in labour-management relations -- including the promotion of tripartism -- and improving remuneration policies and pay administration systems.
122. Total expenditure in 1995 was over $1.1 million, some 7.1 per cent higher than in 1994. Multi-bilateral sources accounted for over 86 per cent, while RBTC resources covered nearly 11 per cent of total expenditure. Only 3.5 per cent derived from UNDP allocations. Nevertheless, UNDP resources from TSS-1 and TSS-2 allocations were used during the year in all regions, including Egypt, Bangladesh, Viet Nam, Honduras and Albania.
123. RBTC funds have been used in the area of labour legislation to provide short-term expert technical assistance in drafting, revising or codifying labour legislation with the aim of taking into account changing economic conditions, such as increased competition and high unemployment, while at the same time providing sufficient protection and equality of opportunity to workers and ensuring the application of ratified ILO Conventions and observance of basic human rights. Such assistance has been provided to more than 18 countries, while technical comments were made on nationally prepared draft texts from more than 23 member States.
124. Technical cooperation programmes were generally carried out in the framework of the Active Partnership Policy, involving technical services and the MDTs, and with the full cooperation of recipient member States. Particular steps were taken to promote better understanding and closer cooperation with the World Bank (see box).
125. As in previous years activities under the labour-management relations subprogramme have aimed at strengthening the national labour relations framework, including institutions and procedures for collective bargaining, workers' participation, the settlement of labour disputes, and at ensuring effective participation by employers and workers in economic and social policy formulation. Twenty-five country-level missions were undertaken from headquarters alone, supplementing contributions for subregional and regional tripartite meetings made by the MDTs principally concerned.
126. With funds from the Government of Spain a programme on the development of labour law and labour relations, known as RELASUR (Relaciones de Trabajo en el Cono Sur de America Latina) continued throughout 1995 covering Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay. With financing from Norway, the Asian-Pacific Project on Tripartism (APPOT), which started in 1992, has continued to assist selected countries in the region in their efforts to strengthen their systems and practices of tripartite cooperation, and was expected to be phased out in late 1996.
| Promoting cooperation between the ILO and the World Bank |
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The provision of technical assistance in the revision of labour law remains one of the ILO's main preoccupations. In a number of French-speaking African countries, the World Bank is increasingly concerned by labour law, largely in connection with structural adjustment loans. It has introduced conditions requiring these countries to revise their existing labour legislation to adapt it to the needs of structural adjustment programmes. In responding to the Bank's requirements, certain governments have requested ILO technical assistance in revising the labour laws. The ILO, in agreement with these governments, has taken into account the need to update these laws with a view to providing better protection to workers where this seemed appropriate.
Two major activities have been undertaken so far. The first was an informal workshop in Washington, DC, between ILO and World Bank officials. The goal sought was to sensitize each agency to each others' perspectives. It focused on the French-speaking countries of West Africa. The following issues were discussed: (a) hiring and dismissal; (b) pay and working conditions; (c) privatization and restructuring; and (d) labour institutions. The second was participation in a seminar on employment, labour relations and labour regulation, at the World Bank's Economic Development Institute (EDI), to which the Bank had invited employers' and workers' representatives from various countries. Members of the ILO Governing Body and representatives from ICFTU and IOE also played an active part. The Bank participants focused on economic growth, and in particular on productivity growth, recalling that labour legislation must be realistic and tuned to market realities. Economic problems facing African countries required the revision of labour laws with a view to enhancing competitiveness, attracting foreign direct investment and promoting employment. Existing labour legislation generally catered to only a fraction (10-15 per cent) of the workforce and pointed out that reform measures should be in favour of the silent majority. In responding to the Bank's recent Regional Perspectives on World Development Report 1995: Labor and the Growth Crisis in Sub-Saharan Africa, the ILO team sought to highlight where the World Bank and ILO assessments coincided or diverged. Differences were more of emphasis and nuance, though quite important for the ILO. Labour legislation was an essential means of providing workers with the necessary protection and socially acceptable conditions of employment. As a result of this workshop both the ILO and the Bank participants gained a deeper understanding of each others' perspectives on labour legislation and its revision. For some Bank staff, the ILO's approach, despite its protective overtones, was not sensitive to economic costs. The Bank participants, on the other hand, agreed to review the institutions's anti-regulatory bias in respect of labour legislation, although they strongly emphasized the need for flexibility and for affordable levels of protection. Follow-up cooperation between the ILO and the World Bank in French-speaking West Africa is expected to gain fresh momentum. |
127. To promote effective and equitable pay policies, the programme developed activities covering both national-level pay policy concerns and enterprise-level pay administration issues. The provision of technical advisory services remained an important means of action. Particular emphasis was laid on responding to countries introducing structural adjustment programmes and undergoing a transition to a market economy.
Labour administration
128. In the field of labour administration, many activities were initiated in 1995 with a new approach which gives greater importance to the reinforcement of ministries of labour, in particular to their management capacity. Projects and meetings included interventions in several fields: labour administration, labour inspection and reform of the employment service. Some examples for each of these fields are given briefly below.
129. In Albania, a three-year project to assist the Ministry of Labour came to an end with successful results: a new Labour Code, pilot offices for employment services, new labour inspection services, etc. This project has been renewed for another two-and-a-half years. In South Africa, two initial, fact-finding and project design missions took place jointly with the ILO Turin Centre. At the beginning of 1996, two systems audit missions were fielded to evaluate the performance of the Labour Department headquarters (structure, policies, functions, organization), and its two main operational systems: labour inspection and employment services. Two comprehensive evaluation reports have already been submitted to the Government. A high-level tripartite national policy development symposium, based on the findings, conclusions and recommendations of the above mission, is planned for later in the year. A series of successful high-level seminars on "modern labour administration or development in transition economies" were organized with and co-financed by the Government of Cyprus in 1995. A new programme to develop the labour administration of Azerbaijan was initiated.
130. Support to labour inspection systems included Phase II of a subregional labour inspection development programme for the three Baltic States, which started at the beginning of the biennium 1996-97. This aims to make labour inspection systems and their field structures more effective and efficient and, after a transition period, to enable them to attain operational levels approaching those of EU member countries. Assessments of the present functions, plans and shortcomings of national labour inspectorates were completed in 1995, thus laying the ground for national policies on labour protection, the design of functional workplace information management systems (WIMS) and comprehensive training and education programmes for labour inspectors and labour protection experts in enterprises and in educational and research institutions.
131. Finally, as regards the reform of the employment service in South-East Asia, a training programme (financed by France) was in progress in Viet Nam, Cambodia and the Lao People's Democratic Republic. The main objectives are to develop pedagogical tools and train more than 150 employment officers. The focus so far has been on a management training programme designed to reorganize the employment services. Another regional project in progress since mid-1996 concerned the development of employment services for English-speaking African countries. A subregional seminar on the role of the public employment service in self-employment promotion was organized by the Polish authorities for eight transition-economy countries.
Working conditions and environment
132. The overall objective of this major programme is to enhance the capacity of government institutions and of employers' and workers' organizations to participate effectively in the design, implementation and evaluation of policies and programmes to improve working conditions and the working environment and to combat child labour.
Child labour
133. Launched in 1992, the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) has streamlined its strategy to combat child labour. The child labour problem is enormous. The efforts and the funds to solve it need to be commensurate with the task involved. In the long term the child labour problem can only be solved from within the countries themselves. Therefore, IPEC needs to concentrate on the eradication of the most abusive and exploitative types of child labour, to put emphasis on preventive measures and to build in sustainability in participating countries from the outset. Priority target groups are bonded child labourers, children working in hazardous occupations and under abusive conditions, very young working children (below 12 years of age), and working girls.
134. The starting-point for implementing IPEC's strategy in participating countries is the will and commitment of individual governments to address child labour in cooperation and consultation with employers' organizations, workers' organizations, other NGOs and relevant parties such as universities and the media. They are supported to adopt measures which aim at preventing child labour, withdrawing children from hazardous work and providing alternatives, and improving working conditions as a transitional measure towards the elimination of child labour. In IPEC's view the best way to strengthen the capacity of partner organizations is to apply a phased and multi-sectoral strategy, consisting of the following steps:
- motivating ILO constituents and other relevant partners to engage in a dialogue on the child labour problems and create alliances to overcome them. This culminates in a formal commitment by the government to cooperate with IPEC through a Memorandum of Understanding between the government and the ILO;
- carrying out a situational analysis to find out the nature and magnitude of child labour problems in a country;
- assisting the concerned parties within a country in devising national policies to address specific child labour problems;
- strengthening existing organizations and setting up institutional mechanisms within a country aimed at building partnerships and creating a sense of in-country ownership. As a rule, a national steering committee is named at the national level, consisting of the concerned ministries, workers' and employers' organizations and NGOs to advise on policy implementation, while similar working committees operate at the project level;
- creating awareness of the problem of child labour nationwide and in the community and the workplace;
- promoting the development and application of protective legislation;
- supporting direct action with (potential) child workers and their entourage to demonstrate that it is possible to prevent children at risk from entering the workforce prematurely and to withdraw working children from hazardous and exploitative work;
- reproducing and expanding successful projects with a view to integrating their strong points into the regular programmes and budgets of the social partners;
- integrating child labour issues into social and economic development policies, plans and budgets.
135. One welcome development is the enhanced attention being paid to the issue of child labour worldwide, and to IPEC in particular, and this has also contributed to resource mobilization. At the outset IPEC was funded by Germany and Belgium. Over the last two years other countries have offered their support: Spain, the United States, Canada, Norway, Australia, France and Luxembourg. The number of participating countries increased from six in 1992-93 to over 20 in 1996-97 and is expected to increase.
136. One of the achievements of the IPEC programme in participating countries has been its contribution towards the creation of a broad social alliance against child labour. Old and new actors are brought together to conduct concrete joint measures. Ministries of labour, traditionally directly responsible for employment issues and child labour, have now taken the lead in coordinating action at the national level. Cooperation with employers, their organizations and workers' organizations has started everywhere, and some of their action programmes are among the more promising.
Occupational safety and health
137. Six interregional and regional technical cooperation programmes, as well as seven individual country projects, were operational in the field of occupational safety and health, providing direct support to governments and to workers' and employers' organizations for the formulation and implementation of national policies, human resources development and capacity-building, the strengthening of factory inspectorates, the safe use of chemicals in agriculture and the development of information infrastructure. Assistance was provided in the form of advisory services, training activities, and the supply of field-testing equipment. DANIDA and FINNIDA provided 77 per cent of the funds, and the balance was allocated by the UNDP.
138. Newly created interregional programmes on national occupational safety and health policies and programming and on human resources development and capacity-building were financed by DANIDA and are implemented on a demand-driven basis.
| Safety and health information programmes in Africa and Asia |
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The total number of work-related accidents each year has grown to an estimated 125 million worldwide. The number of fatal accidents is as high as 220,000 annually. In some occupations, such as forestry, construction and mining, the risk may be up to 10 or 20 times higher than the average. Far from being an obstacle to economic growth, the protection of health, safety and the working environment is integral to sound management, productivity and quality control.
The FINNIDA-funded technical cooperation programmes in Africa and Asia have selected information as a strategy to improve working conditions and environment. Scarce resources can be saved by networking institutions within a country and linking these internationally. This has been carried out by first establishing a human network, which has then been supported by electronic means, namely the Internet. The African Newsletter on Occupational Health and Safety and the Asian-Pacific Newsletter on Occupational Health and Safety have provided a forum for such networking. A specific Global Information Network on Chemicals is being set up to link developing countries to the ILO, WHO, UNEP and other governmental, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations active in this field. |
Conditions of work and welfare facilities
139. The ILO WISE (Work Improvements in Small Enterprises) training methodology continues to be disseminated in different regions of the world. The UNDP-funded project in the Philippines, in its third year, generated several new products, including checklists, productivity indicators and training materials specifically targeted at the garment, food and wood industries. The WISE project in Brazil, in its second year, translated the training materials into Portuguese and adapted them to local practices. Pilot activities, including awareness-raising seminars, training-of-trainers courses and comprehensive workshops for entrepreneurs were carried out in several countries.
140. A systematic process of adaptation of WISE training materials to sectoral activities was started in 1995. The first target sector chosen was the small garment industry in developing countries which, by its contribution to the steady increase in export production, is a major asset to social and economic development. The adaptation of the WISE approach through experience gained from operational activities should help to improve working conditions, particularly those of the high proportion of women workers, and enhance productivity and competitiveness. New training materials for workers in the garment industry are expected to be finalized by the end of 1996.
Social security
141. While the main thrust of the activities of this programme remained at the policy level, with direct requests for support in the design of major reforms requested by countries as diverse as Botswana, China, Honduras, Senegal and Turkey (see box below), the ILO was also asked to undertake direct technical assistance projects aimed at immediate improvements in the functioning of existing schemes; these projects were financed from a variety of sources: RBTC, TSS-1, funds-in-trust arrangements and multilateral agreements, notably with the UNDP and the World Bank. Actuarial analysis continued to play a major role in the ILO's interventions, including through the use of a social expenditure model.
| Turkey: Reform of the social protection system |
| In 1995 the ILO successfully tendered for a major social protection reform project for the Government of Turkey, financed by a World Bank loan. The project involved reviewing and assessing the existing system and designing three pension reform options (in fact the project modelled four options) with compatible social assistance schemes for the poor, elderly and low-income disabled. The modelling was to address the implications of each reform option for the fiscal, economic, income distributional, legal and management aspects. The ILO submitted a total of 24 reports over a nine-month period and made a number of presentations to a Steering Committee of high-level Turkish officials. They established that the existing schemes were financially and managerially unsustainable and required major reform. In particular, there was a need to raise the retirement age and the contribution ceiling, and to improve compliance and management; these changes needed to take place regardless of whether the Turkish Government decided to implement major reforms. As regards such reforms, the reports showed there were a variety of viable options available to the Turkish Government and that phasing of the transition period to a new system was a crucial issue. Finally, as regards social assistance, the reports showed that there was an existing functioning social assistance scheme, which could interact with any of the reform options, though its existing benefit levels were very low and needed to be substantially increased. The Turkish authorities have accepted the ILO reports and published the final report. |
142. Efforts continued to ensure more efficient liaison with the World Bank, which plays a significant role in the field of social security reform. New working relations were also developed with other international organizations active in technical cooperation in the field of social security, such as the EU, the OISS (Ibero-American Organization for Social Security) and the CIPRES (Interafrican Centre for Social Insurance).
143. Staff training has proved a crucial ingredient of successful, i.e. sustainable, technical cooperation activities in the field of social security. Standard materials are therefore designed in several languages, in addition to tailor-made interventions to meet more specific needs. This type of action is expected to gain even greater prominence in the future, provided, however, that adequate resources can be identified.
Labour information and statistics
Labour information
144. Under the International Labour Information System (ILIS) programme, the ILO library's technical cooperation activities are intended to help member States better manage their labour information. To this end, the ILO library funds and organizes training courses for managers of labour libraries and documentation centres, at headquarters and in the field. An active programme of advisory and technical assistance missions (see box) has also resulted in the creation of labour information centres in member States where none previously existed. In 1994-95, $70,500 of ILO library RBTC funds were spent on such activities worldwide, in addition to funding from the library's regular budget. Librarians and documentalists were trained in many member States, sometimes through advisory and training missions. In addition, the library prepared, or assisted in the preparation of, projects and development documents for labour information centres in several countries.
| Assistance to ILO constituents in setting up labour information centres |
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A key objective of the ILO library's ILIS (International Labour Information System) programme is to help ILO constituents develop an appropriate information management infrastructure. A major ILIS activity has been to help establish labour information centres in countries where there were none, thus providing ILO constituents and partner institutions with access to the wealth of labour and employment information produced by the ILO, or made available by the ILO.
Between 1991 and 1995, seven ministries of labour in Latin America, two in Africa, and two in Eastern Europe, set up labour information centres with help from the ILO library, with all but one computerized. The countries involved were Angola, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Lithuania, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Panama, Ukraine, Uruguay and Venezuela. In addition, information centres were set up in a workers' organization in Angola and an employers' organization in Costa Rica. The ILO library's role was to organize tripartite seminars at national or regional level to introduce participants to ILO information services (bibliographic, legal and statistical), to offer training and advice on procedures and techniques for setting up an information centre, to provide subsets of the LABORDOC database for local use, and to arrange for the supply of basic ILO publications. RBTC funds were used, except in two cases where costs were met by the recipients. The ILO's financial contribution was catalytic, as the institutions concerned funded the costs of establishing and maintaining the centres, including premises, equipment, basic collections of materials and staff salaries. The library's experience has been that, once started, the centres have been maintained and improved. |
145. With the implementation of the Active Partnership Policy, the inclusion of information management components in national activities is becoming more widespread, and the ILO library, working with the Regional Office, is especially active in such efforts in Africa. For 1996-97 the ILO library has designed activities for Eastern Europe, the Pacific, Portuguese-speaking African countries and the Caribbean and Andean subregions.
Labour statistics
146. Operational activities in this field are designed to help member States produce useful, reliable and comparable labour statistics in line with international standards and to develop national classifications of occupations. In 1995, $420,000 were spent, including UNDP-funded projects in Zimbabwe, a World Bank-funded project in Turkey, trust-fund projects in Pakistan, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and in Central and Eastern Europe.
Operational activities of the International
Training Centre of the ILO, Turin
147. The overall volume of training activities implemented by the Turin Centre attained $17.3 million in 1995, representing an increase of over $2 million compared with the previous year. The total number of participants in the training programmes (see Appendix VII and Appendix VIII) also increased, from 2,784 in 1994 to 3,488 in 1995. This result was achieved through a variety of funding schemes, which included grants from multilateral and bilateral donor agencies, participation in international competitive bidding and direct contributions from the recipient countries themselves. Approximately 80 per cent of the training activities were undertaken in core mandate areas of the ILO. These were designed and implemented in close collaboration with headquarters' technical departments, field offices and multidisciplinary teams. The Centre also strengthened its training programme in support of the UN system, which included areas such as organizational management, the management of technical cooperation, peace-keeping and fundamental human rights. A feasibility study on the creation of the UN Staff College was concluded in 1995, leading to the designation by the UN Secretary-General, in early 1996, of the Turin Centre as the implementing agency of the Staff College project.
Notes
6 GB.265/ESP/1. See also a paper submitted to the Committee on Employment and Social Policy on this subject at the present session (GB.267/ESP/1).