SOCIAL DIALOGUE COMMITTEE IN THE EU FOOD AND DRINK INDUSTRY

Transcription

1 SOCIAL DIALOGUE COMMITTEE IN THE EU FOOD AND DRINK INDUSTRY Draft Work Programme Topics for joint actions and activities Topic & Background Action Objectives Output Timeframe 1. Implementation of Deliver an overview of the sector 1. Report 28 September DG EMPL Budget line economic analysis and workforce 2012 project Ensuring demographics. 2. Executive - 28 September sustainable employment 2. Identify, define and map current and summaries and competitiveness in emerging workforce skills and the EU food and drink competence needs. This includes the typical sector: meeting the development of a set of typical professional profiles challenges of the labour market. 1. Ensuring competitiveness and sustainable employment in the European food and drink sector: meeting the challenges of the labour market. Ref. to Work Programme 2012 professional profiles the industry regularly looks for with concrete examples drawn both from large companies and SMEs. 3. Compile a Compendium of good practices on employability and upskilling measures 4. Provide relevant analysis and conclusions to enable EU Food & Drink Industry Social Partners to draw conclusions and prepare further steps in the field of Sustainable employment and competitiveness as appropriate. 5. Share and communicate the delivered analysis, the compendium of good practices and Social Partner recommendation for action to relevant stakeholders. 4. Compendium of good practices 5. EU conference for dissemination of results

2 Work to be initiated in preparation of joint Social and continued in Partner actions on the 2014 topic. 2. Youth employment Youth unemployment has become a major social and economic problem in the EU: that is why the EU Commission has launched a series of important initiatives to tackle youth unemployment and is calling on all EU actors to take up this challenge. Among these are the Youth Opportunities Initiative 1, Youth on the Move 2 and a targeted use of the European Social and Structural Funds. Virtually all EU social dialogue committee have worked or are working on this topic, some going as far as to launch a sector-specific youth pact, such as in the construction sector 3. Young people especially women are often exceedingly at a disadvantage when entering the labour market and have less chances of getting into productive, quality employment than workers with experience. The current crisis has exacerbated this situation. At 22.4%, the EU unemployment rate for people under 25 is more than twice the rate for adults. And those young people who have managed to find jobs face 1. Review of existing sector and company good practices. 2. Issue sector-specific recommendations and definition of further joint work on the topic 3. Generating synergies with SD Programme Item 1 Sustainable employment and competitiveness, notably in the areas of youth and senior workforce. 4. Generating sector-specific synergies with EU initiatives (e.g. Youth Opportunities Initiative, Youth on the Move, Work, New Skills for New Jobs Agenda etc.) 5. Exploring the use of the EU Social Fund and the EU Structural Funds for the sector to promote Youth Employment in the sector 6. Exploring ways of promoting crossborder mobility of young workers in the EU food and drink sector 1. First sectorspecific identification of obstacles 2. Dynamic compendium of good practices 3. Joint recommendation (to be considered 1 EU Commission 2 EU Commission 3 EU Commission, European Sectoral Social Dialogue, 2010

3 other hardships. It is over 30% in eight Member States, and in Spain and Greece it is over 50%. Even more worrying are the 7.5 million young people who are neither in employment, nor in education or training 4. As the largest single EU industrial sector, the EU Food and Drink industry plays a major role in providing access to the labour market and the social inclusion of large numbers of EU workers. It is therefore worth exploring the youth employment potential the EU food and drink industry represents for young EU workers and its contribution in easing the youth employment crisis. 3. Managing an Ageing Workforce The age structure of the workforce is changing rapidly in all countries. In the EU over the next years the numbers of young people will decline while the numbers of senior workers will increase. The ageing of the workforce implies a radical change in human resource strategies and a new approach to managing age at the workplace. Future competitiveness will rest partly on the performance and productivity of ageing workforces and, therefore, on the preparation of joint Social Partner actions on the topic. 1. Review of existing sector and company good practices. 2. Identification and assessment of relevant issues related to an ageing workforce i.e. health, training, stress at the workplace, work-life balance, transmission of know-how and training of next worker generation. 3. Issue sector-specific recommendations and definition of further joint work on the topic. 3. Generate synergies with and build on existing initiatives and analyses, i.e. the Identification good practices in different EU member countries In the latter part of after the completion of the 01 and continuing into Laszlo Andor, Tackling the youth unemployment challenge, Improving employability and labour market participation among young people, 18 July 2012,

4 European Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing. efficient use of older workers. An ageing workforce is likely to be one of the major issues facing the European food and drink industry that comes out of the Ensuring Competitiveness and Sustainable Employment research project that is currently ongoing. 4. Solvency The European Commission and the European Insurance and Occupational Pension Authority (EIOPA) continue their preparation work on the revision of the Pension Fund Directive, well known as Solvency II. BusinessEurope and ETUC and other organisations agreed on a joint statement on the topic requested the Commission to make changes to this proposal. Elaborate a joint statement. Play an active role in a debate of importance to the food and drink sector and which is high on the agenda in the EU arena Joint statement First half of 5. Nanotechnology in food and drinks Europe2020 includes nanotechnology among the key technologies for sustainable growth, improving the competitiveness of Europe's industries, and creating highly-skilled jobs. Nanotechnology use in food ingredients, packaging and manufacturing technology are topics currently under discussion. views of Social Partners on the topic. Identification of potential common points and areas for common work. To be determined. Work to be initiated in and continued in 2014 (if needed)

5 EU Social Dialogue Food and Drink Industry calendar Event Date & Venue Working group, 16 April Working, 17 October Plenary SD Committee Meeting, 29 November Key dates of the joint EFFAT-FoodDrinkEurope project schedule Ensuring sustainable employment and competitiveness in the EU Food and Drink sector: meeting the challenges of the labour market 10 Dec st Project Steering Project Steering meeting to validate the research plan and methodology. 15 March 6-7 June 9 July afternoon To be identified by the Project St 2 nd Project Steering EFFAT- FoodDrinkEurope membership consultation meeting 3 nd Project Steering Project Steering meeting to evaluate the first progress results and adjust methodology and research plan as required Membership consultation meeting in followed by a Steering Committee for the validation of the results emerged from the research and of the proposed solutions and recommendations. Discussion on practical implementation, dissemination strategy, and follow up, first evaluation. 20 Sept. EU Conference on Employability and Competitiveness in the EU Food and Drink Industry Public EU Launch event on in including EFFAT and FDE membership, relevant national and EU institutions, media and stakeholders Launch of the Report.