New cooperation in the field of TVET and the labour market
 
Agence Française de Développement (AFD) and GTZ made their cooperation official by signing a Memorandum of Understanding on the subject of “TVET and the labour market”. This agreement is primarily intended to improve cooperation with partner countries by working more closely together and to add more authority to common positions in the international debate.

The first joint conference entitled “Beyond Primary Education: The Relevance of TVET in ‘Post Primary Education for All’” held in Berlin on 23 October 2008 was attended by over 100 experts from more than 25 countries. The Education for All initiative by UNESCO has been very successful in improving primary education. However, now the focus is on reforming secondary education in many partner countries and thereby creating broad-impact, labour market-oriented services, to which poor people also have access. In this light, secondary education should be geared towards meeting both the needs of the economy on the one hand and, at the same time, achieving social policy objectives. Both AFD and GTZ agree precisely on the importance of this issue.
The following key questions concerning this theme were examined in depth at the conference and debated in a fruitful dialogue with experts from Africa, Asia and Europe:
How can a broader public be assured access to TVET? What should strategies for life long learning look like in order for aspects in other areas of the education system, especially at the primary and academic school levels, to be integrated into TVET? What experience has been gained by different countries in reference to cooperative planning and management of TVET systems? And finally, which arguments can be used to convince states, industries and societies to invest more in TVET?

Documentation of the Conference

• Conference Results
• Programme
• Welcome Speech and Presentations
• Presentations of the Working Groups