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GB.270/TC/1(Add)
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Committee on Technical Cooperation |
TC |
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FIRST ITEM ON THE AGENDA
The ILO's technical cooperation programme, 1996-97
Addendum
Regional trends and issues
1. This Addendum highlights some major issues and trends in the regions. It complements the section of the main report concerning the ILO's technical programmes, including their implementation in the regions and their contribution to meeting the major objectives of the organization. The field offices were in the front line of the implementation of the Active Partnership Policy, strengthening relations with constituents and other development partners. They played a significant role in developing and maintaining relations with UNDP, UN agencies and financing agencies present at the national and regional levels. The field structure also collaborated with the Turin Centre in the development of the latter's regional training programmes.
Africa
2. The widespread implementation of structural adjustment programmes in the region has entailed cutbacks in public and private sector employment. The result has been increased unemployment, significant reductions in household income and an increase in poverty in the region, which already contains the highest number of least developed countries. Moreover, many countries are experiencing crisis conditions or need to deal with the aftermath of armed conflict.
3. There has been an emerging consensus in most African countries on the need to support economic reforms with greater emphasis on democratization, human rights and social justice. The ILO's priority objectives have been highly relevant to this environment. In a region where fewer than 10 per cent of workers are employed in the formal sector and income-generating activities are dominated by the informal sector, it is important for the ILO to enter into broad-based partnerships for development if its values are to have a meaningful impact on a significant proportion of the working population.
4. The region maintained its share of expenditure in 1996 compared with the previous year. However, as noted in the report, the programme in the region has contracted by about 50 per cent between 1992 and 1996. In order to ensure that the Office can make a credible response to the demands of constituents, including through the country objective exercises, the Regional Office has placed great emphasis on resource mobilization, including the appointment of a senior officer responsible for resource mobilization at the regional level.
5. Some of the major initiatives for employment promotion in the region have been highlighted in the report. The work done under the Jobs for Africa Programme is likely to be one of the major employment promotion initiatives in the forthcoming period. It is envisaged that activities in support of employment promotion will remain the highest priority for the region. It is projected that the best prospects for job creation lie in the promotion of small and micro-enterprises and cooperatives, and labour-based employment programmes. At the same time, strong emphasis will need to be placed on improving working conditions in both the formal and informal sectors. There is also a strong need and demand for the expansion of IPEC activities in the region.
6. The Regional Office has been supporting the decentralization process by emphasizing human resource development and training, improving information systems and management tools, and enhancing programming, monitoring and evaluation.
Asia and the Pacific
7. The ILO has the challenge of providing appropriate services in this region, which shows a wide range of economies, including very advanced industrialized economies, high-growth, newly industrialized countries, those in transition from central planning to free markets, and some of the least developed countries with mainly agrarian economies. The regional programme has been designed to tackle the major problems experienced in these circumstances, particularly those associated with economic restructuring, such as increased unemployment; eroded worker protection and industrial conflict; extreme poverty and social exclusion; and the effects of globalization.
8. As noted in the report, the technical programme contracted by 12.6 per cent between 1995 and 1996 in this region. Simultaneously, demand was increasing, signalling the constituents' satisfaction with the quality and relevance of the ILO's technical assistance. One of the fundamental problems in matching demand by the delivery of services was the divergence between the priorities defined by ILO member States and donors' preferences, including their geographical priorities, resulting in certain imbalances within and between countries. In this regard, it is notable that in several countries, IPEC-related activities accounted for the greater part of the ILO's extra-budgetary programme. One aim, therefore, is to improve the balance in the country programmes. Japan remained the largest source of external funds for the region in the reporting period.
9. A number of country-level, regional and interregional initiatives were pursued in support of the ILO's three priority objectives. At the regional level, priority was given to those initiatives which provided direct services to constituents at the national level. The strengthening of country programmes was assisted by the execution of the country objective exercise. Approximately 40 per cent of technical cooperation expenditure in the region in 1996 supported employment promotion and poverty alleviation activities. Issues pertaining to labour relations and tripartism also emerged as major priorities in the country objective exercises. The Norwegian-funded programme on promoting tripartism and sound labour relations will make a significant contribution in the countries covered in dealing with the persistent relative weakness of industrial relations systems, latent social instability arising from economic imbalances and widening income disparity in a number of countries.
10. Worker protection has been a high priority in the region. In response to the demand for assistance in the field of occupational safety and health (OSH), an OSH expert has recently been assigned to the New Delhi MDT as a short-term measure. Many countries in the region continued to benefit from participation in the IPEC programme. Regional RBTC resources have been used to supplement IPEC resources.
11. Programmes of direct support for workers and employers were important in the region. The focus of the ILO's work for the former was to strengthen workers' organizations so as to improve their strategic orientation and capacity to contribute effectively to the search for solutions to the contemporary issues of globalization and market liberalization. Within this broad framework, a number of activities were undertaken dealing with issues such as OSH, gender, child labour, EPZs, migrant workers and specific ILS promotional activities.
12. The ILO aimed to help employers' organizations identify the major strategic challenges within the regional environment and to devise the most appropriate responses. They were assisted in income-generating activities and in establishing and upgrading information systems and research capacity as part of their effort to broaden their membership base.
13. With respect to general issues having a bearing on the relevance, efficiency and impact of the programme, there has been good progress with staff training in the technical, management and administrative fields. This has had a positive effect on the decentralization process, and various parts of the field structure are increasingly assuming backstopping responsibilities. One major constraint was linked to gaps in MDT staffing. In such cases, headquarters support continued to be required. One major requirement is an effective resource mobilization effort involving the field and headquarters, so as to make good the gap in financing mentioned above.
Latin America
14. Where the country objective exercises have been undertaken, the technical cooperation programme in this region has been increasingly based on the objectives formulated at the national and subregional levels. The latter applies to Central America, where the objectives have been defined at the subregional level. The objective-oriented approach has also been particularly visible in Brazil and the Andean countries. In the latter, there is a network of national and subregional projects or special funds in support of the agreed programmes and activities. Anomalies resulting from projects initiated before the start of the country objective exercises or without adequate field/headquarters consultations should soon be the exception. Work is continuing to complete the outstanding country objectives.
15. Technical cooperation expenditure in the region fell by 20 per cent between 1995 and 1996: the expenditure of $10.1 million in 1996 was significantly below the 1990 level of $16 million. Delivery was adversely affected in 1996, in part as a result of some problems associated with decentralization. The major contribution by Spain to IPEC activities in 1995, together with the expected results of resource mobilization initiatives in 1996-97, should have a positive impact on the size of the programme in the forthcoming period.
16. The country objective exercises in the Andean region have emphasized employment promotion and the strengthening of the social partners and social dialogue. CINTERFOR has been an important presence in the ILO's training programme in the region. It was requested to provide technical support to 47 meetings during the reporting period. In terms of worker protection, the contribution by Spain to IPEC has given a boost to activities related to child labour in the region, where 12 national committees for the eradication of child labour have now been established. Two other areas of concern have been the improvement of working conditions, security and occupational safety and health in the context of subregional economic integration and the globalization process, and working conditions in informal-sector activities.
17. The country objective exercises have in themselves lent impetus to resource mobilization: countries have become interested in financing ILO activities from their own resources in areas of core concern. This was the case in Brazil, for example, where national institutions have financed activities in employment, training and occupational safety and health. Argentina and Uruguay have also expressed interest in promoting components related to core ILO activities in World Bank-financed programmes. Central America has been a prime beneficiary of the extra-budgetary resources tapped for the region. The Netherlands is an important multi-bilateral partner in this subregion, and the Area Office has played a key role in responding to the decentralized policies of this donor. The MDT in Lima has been successful in tapping resources from regional banks and other entities to provide services to constituents. Within the Caribbean subregion, it has proved quite difficult for the ILO to tap technical cooperation resources for the countries covered by the Port of Spain Office, since many of them do not meet donors' criteria. A highly focused approach to technical cooperation and the development of strategic alliances, with two or three donors using RBTC to tap extra-budgetary resources, is currently being pursued in that subregion.
18. The Regional Office's general policy of using RBTC to leverage extra-budgetary resources for the technical cooperation programme was also applied to workers' and employers' activities. RBTC allocations of $700,000 and $420,000 were complemented by extra-budgetary resources of $3,222,559 and $1,500,000 respectively. Workers' and employers' organizations also benefited from participation in tripartite projects with associated expenditure of about $4 million. Workers' and employers' representatives have also, in some cases, successfully lobbied for ILO participation in national technical cooperation programmes.
19. A major priority in the forthcoming period is to accelerate and improve the decentralization process. Great emphasis is also placed on strengthening country-level programmes backed by a sound resource mobilization drive, based on good interaction between the field and headquarters. Monitoring and reporting on the technical cooperation programme is another area of concern that will be the subject of collaboration with headquarters.
Europe
20. The technical cooperation programme in the region contracted by 31 per cent following growth of 41 per cent in the previous year. Its overall share dropped from 7.8 per cent in 1995 to 6.2 per cent in 1996.
21. The Central and Eastern European Multidisciplinary Team liaised with various headquarters' departments and bureaux and the Turin Centre to provide consultancies, advisory services and national and subregional projects in response to constituents' specific needs and demands. Work focused in particular on assisting the development of democratic labour institutions and tripartism in Central and Eastern Europe, and assisting in the adoption and implementation of policies that steer the transition towards market economies in socially desirable directions. Particular emphasis was placed on the development of labour legislation through the ratification and implementation of international labour standards; the promotion of full, productive and freely chosen employment; the improvement of working and living conditions; sound labour relations; the strengthening of independent employers' and workers' organizations; and appropriate systems of social protection. Assistance was also provided on labour statistics, labour administration, management development and small enterprise promotion, vocational training and the promotion of gender equality.
22. In Central Europe, one of the objectives of the technical cooperation programme was to provide the countries seeking accession to the European Union with impartial, high-quality and internationally comparable factual information, quantitative analyses and exchange of experience, in line with European legislation and international labour standards. In Eastern Europe and Central Asia, specific assistance was focused, in some countries, on reviews of social policy as an integral part of macroeconomic reform.
23. As noted in the main report, there was a significant increase in technical cooperation activities in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Five new pipeline proposals dealing with employment promotion are being finalized, including the creation of small and medium-sized enterprises, occupational training for women, occupational rehabilitation and employment promotion. It is expected that financing will be received from the Italian Government, UNDP, the Government of Belgium and the European Union for these activities. The ILO Support Unit funded by the Government of Luxembourg has provided the ILO with greater visibility concerning its practical activities and its role in the post-conflict social reconstruction of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
24. In the region, the Active Partnership Policy will continue to provide the overall framework for ILO action, promoting greater involvement and commitment of the ILO's constituents in joint activities, and a more proactive relationship with the donor community and the UN system. One main concern will be to achieve a good balance between advisory services and other activities so as to ensure adequate follow-up, a coherent and integrated ILO approach and in order to translate upstream activities into downstream technical projects funded by donors, whether nationally executed or not.
Arab States of the Middle East
25. The technical cooperation programme in the region remained fairly stable, with expenditure of $2.6 million in 1996, compared with $2.7 million in the preceding year. Encouragingly, approvals increased from $4.5 million to $5 million during this period, while approvals for the first half of 1997 total $2.8 million. Projects in the West Bank and Gaza account for some 50 per cent of approvals to date in the region in the current biennium, and focus mainly on small enterprise development, employment promotion and workers' education.
26. Efforts were made to promote the active involvement of employers' and workers' organizations in the technical cooperation programme through consultations on specific issues such as child labour, and through their participation in steering committees, as in the case of the Palestinian Employment Programme. The ILO and the Arab Labour Organization also collaborated to organize a regional seminar on the role of employers' and workers' organizations in occupational safety and health and a tripartite subregional technical meeting on the development of the role of employment services.
27. The experience of the Regional Office in maintaining contacts with UNDP and recipient governments at the country level has highlighted the importance of being able to deliver technical services of a high standard, and to have readily available information and data on the economic and social conditions most relevant to ILO activities so as to ensure timely and successful intervention. The experience of the Office in resource mobilization initiatives, which have helped to diversify the donor base in the region, have also underlined the importance of the timely availability of suitable technical expertise from the ILO. This has also been important in view of the increasing interest of donors such as Italy in working with the ILO on the technical aspects of the activities.
Geneva, 16 October 1997.