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BULLETIN 147
Innovations in training

September-December 1999

 

(Full text available only in Spanish)

 

THIS ISSUE

The papers of this special edition of the Boletín were submitted at the Latin American-German Workshop on vocational training held in Berlin, Germany, from 29 to 31 March, 1999.

The present volume starts by introducing a typology worked out by Cinterfor/ILO of the different institutional arrangements of vocational training in various countries of the region. This classification is based on the way two essential factors are co-ordinated: the level at which training policies and strategies are processed, and the specific actors that manage them.

On the other hand, Fernando Vargas Zúñiga, Cinterfor consultant, examines what he calls the four key factors, or critical factors of the vocational training offer in the region: local management, meeting demands, quality requirements and the need for ongoing research in order to respond to diversified demand. Elenice Montero Leite, at the time OREALC/UNESCO Expert in Technical Education and Training, considers the profile that vocational training institutions should develop in order to adapt to the new economic and social realities of countries of the region.

The topic of financing of vocational training is discussed in two articles, from different angles. Eduardo Martínez Espinoza, a well known consultant on the subject, points to the need of selective public financing targeting relegated populations and strategic projects that the private sector is not likely to fund. Victor Agüero and Guillermo Labarca, consultants to the Joint ECLAC/UNIDO Industrial and Technological Development Unit propose an original initiative: the creation of Individual Training Funds similar to private retirement and social security funds.

Juan Casillas, Operations Director of INFOTEP (Dominican Republic), and Daniel Hernández and Jorge Sotelo, at the time high executives of INET (Argentina), submit different experiences of decentralisation of vocational training.

Paulo Rech, SENAI Education and Technology Director (Santa Catarina, Brazil) considers that quality management in vocational training is an essential element that the institutions concerned must take into account, for their very survival. Alejandra Villarzú Gallo, Director of the Metropolitan Region of SENCE (Chile) describes the lengthy experience of her institution in that respect.

The subject of research in vocational training is discussed in two articles. Marcio Medalha Trigueiros, consultant to the General Direction of SENAC (Brazil), gives a critical view of studies of the labour market, which he sees as an "evanescent reality", and the difficulties that research in that field presents, in terms of costs and delayed results that he calls "the paradox of obsolescence". María Antonia Gallart, researcher at the CENEP (Argentina) offers a general survey of the various research approaches of the last decade, and suggests some of the features she considers necessary for future research into vocational training.

This special number is closed by an article by María de Ibarriola on the transformations undergone by vocational training policies in Latin America that she submitted at a meeting of the Economic Policy Association of Canada (Quebec, November 1999).

Also in this area, in the Documents section, is the CEDEFOP Report Training for a Changing Society (1998), with a prologue by Edith Cresson, European Union Commissionaire for Science, Research, Human Resources, Education, Training and Youth.

Included in the same section is an Address at the 87^th Meeting of the International Labour Conference, by Amartya Sen, an interesting study of labour realities in the present world, with its contradictions and paradoxes, which leads to a lucid ethical analysis of rights and obligations, pinpointing democracy as the missing preventive factor in the great economic crises of Asian countries in the last decade.

The new role to be played by trade unions, as privileged actors to provide a human visage to globalised economy, insofar as they can go beyond sectoral interests to serve those of society at large and co-ordinate the necessary alliances for that purpose, in an essentially political process, is what Juan Somavía, ILO Director General, analyses in his Main Address. Only in this manner can trade unions fulfil their original function, i.e. ensure the participation of all society in the fruits of development and promote democracy and the respect for human rights.

 

 

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