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Introduction
The ILO Sub-regional Office for Eastern Africa provides technical advisory services to ILO constituents and social partners in the development and use of labour market information (LMI) for employment monitoring and appropriate policy formulation.
It also collaborates with the ILO Bureau of Statistics (STAT) and the ILO Department of Policy Integration and Statistics (INTEGRATION) in providing users within and outside the ILO with relevant, timely and reliable labour statistics, developing international standards for better measurement of labour issues and enhanced international comparability, and in helping member States to develop and improve their labour statistics. The ILO SRO for Eastern Africa is currently working with STAT and INTEGRATION in assisting constituents and providing them with appropriate technical assistance in measuring and monitoring decent work.
The importance of LMI and its role in the current economic crisis
Labour market information are used in both developed and developing world not only to measure and describe the size, structure and characteristics of various participants in the labour market, but also to inform a proper employment policy making and social economic policy development. LMI are at the core of measuring the progress in achieving the ILO four strategic objectives as well as progress in achieving social justice and the relevant MDG targets. Political leaders and other social partners need labour market information to assess and show to their constituents the progress they have contributed to towards achieving social justice in particular and economic development in general.
More recently with the current financial and economic crisis, coupled with a precedent prices crisis in Africa, LMI have acquired a contextual importance as countries needs to assess on regular basis how far the crisis has affected their economic development and advise appropriate responses timely. Africa and in particular the Eastern Africa sub-region needs definitely to have at hands a number of indicators to assist in monitoring the progress in their decent work implementation and poverty reduction efforts, or in a fair way, to assess how far their efforts are affected by the recent and current crises. ILO will therefore assist and advise countries in the sub-region to put LMI high among their poverty and social development monitoring indicators.
Specific objectives of the ILO SRO for Eastern Africa in the biennium 2008-2009
In the above context the ILO SRO for Eastern Africa is readjusting its objectives for the biennium 2008-2009 in order to provide proper responses to constituents and social partners, and to help them to establish credible and sustainable labour market information systems (LMIS). Specific objectives in this biennium include among other:
- Promote and support labour force surveys (LFS) and national manpower surveys (NMS) exercises and regular collection of labour market data in all countries covered by the Office,
- Promote the analysis, dissemination and regular use of labour market information for social and economic policy formulation, and increase awareness raising on the importance of regular trends on the level and characteristics of employment and labour demand,
- Capacity building of social partners in the collection, analysis and use of LMI, through organizing or promoting national and sub-regional training on LMI, including working with universities and research institutions for the promotion and development of social research on LMI,
- Based on the ILO current methodology on measuring decent work, provide support to the development of a global methodology to strengthen the capacity of African countries to self-monitor and self-assess progress towards decent work, and
- Promote regional and sub-regional cooperation, south-south cooperation, and networking on the development of LMI, and promote international technical cooperation for the development of LMI in Africa in general and in the sub-region in particular.
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