In the Argentine Republic, the Vocational Training Council of Rosario and its Region (CCFP) was created in late 1997. It is a bipartite entity made up by trade union and entrepreneurial organisations, whose objective is the improvement and upgrading of the occupational profiles of all workers, both employed or circumstantially out of work; in the latter case they are retrained. To achieve its ends, the CCFP intends to undertake the following activities, among others:

• Exchanging ideas, experiences and knowledge;
• Organising congresses, lectures, seminars and courses by specialised individuals and/or institutions for the benefit both of workers and employers;
• Co-operation with universities, Argentine or foreign public and private organisations or international agencies promoting manpower training and upgrading.
• Co-operating and co-ordinating efforts with public or private organisations pursuing the same or similar ends.
• Creation of libraries, newspaper collections. film libraries etc. to make bibliography and knowledge available in all training areas of interest to the CCFP.
• Promoting research, studies and specialised papers in the above areas.
• Developing and conducting job profile diagnoses identifying the basic and specific skills –occupational standards – of general competency tasks, and work posts within them, in different sectors of activity.
• Supporting alliances among firms and enterprises and training institutions in order to bring down the costs of modules, and co-ordinating them to provide occupational outlets saving time and resources for workers and enterprises.

CCFP is directed by a Board of fourteen members, seven of which represent trade unions, the other seven, employers’ associations.

Among activities on the working schedule of CCFP were, first of all, activities of organisational and institutional consolidation and management with national and municipal authorities; management of foreign technical assistance; management of legal representation of CCFP, solving infrastructure problems. These items were followed by work guidelines for the direct improvement of occupational training in the region, with tasks such as: initial survey of training needs of the public and private sectors regarding basic, general and specific skills; strengthening of the training offer through actions aimed at improving curricula and encouraging competition on the basis of costs and quality of courses, and the installation of sectoral committees to identify specific competencies at the request of sectors.

Local management of vocational training in Brazil

In Brazil, the long and far reaching experience of SENAI, SENAC and more recently SENAR in the agrarian sector, are examples of national action that finds concrete expression according to the reality of the different federal states. All these Brazilian institutions have a regionalised structure, in which the Regional Departments enjoy a high degree of autonomy vis-à-vis National Directorates. This independence is not achieved, as in other cases, by virtue of a central decision to delegate administrative, policy or organisational decisions; it is backed and legitimised by the fact that, in each state, the respective local industrial or commercial chamber is responsible for the management, infrastructure and resources of the Regional Department. This active involvement of local entrepreneurs in institutional management, is reinforced by the fact that this same decentralisation and autonomy facilitates a whole range of co-operation and business schemes within the social, economic and cultural sphere of the State, with local authorities, trade unions or civil society organisations.

Also in Brazil, the Training and Professional Development Secretariat (SEFOR) is sponsoring schemes to strengthen local management, in order to promote the involvement of new players in the administration, management and development of training programmes. One of the main lines in this connection is the creation of the Public Vocational Training Centres (CEPFP), through the States’ Secretariats for Employment and Labour Relations (SERT) of the states of Sao Paulo and Ceará, among others. They are designed as flexible sources of training supply to meet the specific and permanent demands of young and adult workers, employed and unemployed, independent workers and micro enterprises. It is a public, collective and co-operative training offer managed by the local community.

Its principal mission is to co-ordinate the needs and requirements of all local players, and find joint solutions that may be available in the communities themselves, or in outside communities, such as state and federal universities. Training programmes favour a selective appropriation of scientific, technical and technological knowledge and more general information on man and society, that is essential to the education of the working citizen.

Apart from its training programmes, the CEPFP constitutes an information source for workers and employers, fostering greater integration between training actions, enterprises and communities. It also serves to co-ordinate among all education professionals who act on the formal side of training, or at enterprises, in trade unions and governmental organisations.

Also of great importance is the National Plan for the Further Training of Workers (PLANFOR) that SEFOR began to implement in 1996. PLANFOR action follows three broad lines:

- Conceptual development: which includes the building and consolidation of a new conceptual and methodological approach to vocational education, guided by the effective demand of the productive sector (gathering together the interests and needs of workers, employers and communities), with a view to raising productivity and the quality of labour, improving workers’ employability and the living conditions of the population.

- Institutional co-ordination: mobilisation and strengthening of a national vocational training network made up by public and private institutions having infrastructure and experience in the field, such as: federal and state public schools, universities, "S System", non governmental organisations, trade unions, foundations, etc.

- Support of civil society: aimed at enlarging the supply of flexible ongoing training through the above network, in order to train and retrain at least 20% of the economically active population every year, in particular those groups that traditionally have less chance of benefiting from training action.

Two mechanisms have gradually been consolidated for the implementation of PLANFOR. Their goals are participation, decentralisation and strengthening of local implementation capacities:

- State Further Training Plans (PEQ), that comprise national and state further training programmes, to meet demands negotiated at Municipal Employment Committees or similar bodies, implemented by the local network of public and private vocational education, contracted by the Labour Secretariat in accordance with the legislation in force.

- National and Regional "Parcerias" (partnerships), implemented through agreements, contracts, co-operation arrangements or protocols signed by CODEFAT, the Ministry of Labour, SEFOR, workers’ unions, foundations, universities and other ministries, prioritising conceptual and methodological development and institutional co-ordination.

The National Training Service (SENA) of Colombia, through initiatives like the "Vocational Training Programme for Municipal Development", the "Programme for the Attention of families and special population groups" and the "Programme for the Attention of the social economy sector", has endeavoured to contribute to the development of the human resources involved in municipal management; support the promotion and development of associative economic units for the generation of employment, earnings and social promotion; and integrate disadvantaged persons or groups into the development processes of the country, in conditions of equality.

The "Vocational Training Programme for Municipal Development", addressed at municipal or departmental authorities, technicians of Public Entities and non governmental organisations, and organisations of the active social players in municipalities and departments, includes:

• Training: in Planning, Financial Management, Formulation and Management of Projects, Organisational Management and Community Participation in local management, with emphasis on the training of trainers and officials of departmental and municipal administrations.

• Consulting services: to departmental or municipal councils, on institutional development.

• Technical assistance: on aspects relating to the above mentioned priority areas.

• Technological services: at consulting level, to solve specific problems and criteria of municipal development.

SENA also takes part in the implementation of training and consultancy projects for municipalities.

The "Programme for the Attention of the social economy sector", addressed at directors of social economy enterprises, affiliates of economic units and technicians belonging to public or private organisations and NGOs, offers:

• Training: for the promotion of associative enterprises and second level organisations, for diagnosis and formulation of development plans.

• Consulting services: for socio-entrepreneurial diagnosis, formulation and implementation of plans of action and development, and inter-enterprise integration at regional level.

• Technical assistance: in areas pertaining to associative enterprises.

• Technological services: to overcome difficulties in the design, quality control and modification of products and services.

Finally the "Programme for the Attention of families and special population groups", addressed to persons who work with, or belong to some disadvantaged group, offers services of technical and organisational training to agencies that work with those populations: consultant services on the implementation of vocational training and community organisation methodologies and technologies; technological services focusing on the productive processes of those populations.

Also in Colombia, the experience of the Paisajoven Corporation was the result of a bilateral agreement between the Municipality of Medellin and the German Technical Co-operation (GTZ). It operates in the form of a network that includes municipal bodies, ONGs, foundations, universities and a number of agencies specialising in work with young people.

The objective of Paisajoven is to promote co-ordination among organisations, to professionalise its personnel and organise pilot experiences. The approach adopted by the Corporation implies the training of its personnel, reinforcing impact and co-ordination (development of institutional alliances) for the improvement of the services of organisations. To that end training services are implemented, as well as management consulting, tools grants, a diploma on methodology for the design and evaluation of projects, and courses and seminars by specialised institutions or agencies that work with the young.

The main contribution of Paisajoven in the area of youth employment in Medellin has been a regional model of training for employment. It has identified lack of training as the main cause of structural unemployment, and singled out the local sphere as appropriate for meeting existing training demands. Although these initiatives are costly, they have impact in the medium term.

Training and employment are one of the fourteen lines of action of the Medellin Plan, jointly developed by the State and civil society. Thus, the Municipality of Medellin has promoted a pilot project on "Management model for the training and access to employment of the young", which aims at inter-institutional co-ordination to improve the training offer, promote more efficient management of resources, and have influence in the medium term on structural unemployment.

In Chile, the Programme "Chile Barrio", of the National Training and Employment Service (SENCE) aims at joint action by public organisations that have direct incidence upon the most important poverty indicators. It tries to open up avenues by attracting and co-ordinating financial resources, technical know-how and solidarity support from public programmes and services and the private sector, and making them available to the inhabitants of irregular settlements, so that, with the support of the Programme itself and of local authorities, those inhabitants may join in the collective effort.

The objective of this programme is to help the inhabitants of these precarious settlements in their struggle against poverty. For that purpose, four areas of intervention have been established; community development and insertion into society; occupational and productive enablement; improvement of housing and neighbourhood; and institutional strengthening of programmes aimed at overcoming poverty. Regarding occupational and productive enablement, the specific objective is to provide to the inhabitants of these settlements better opportunities to generate earnings, through occupational training actions for alternative employment and self-employment, and support of initiatives for independent work and micro enterprises. To reach those goals, the Programme has two lines of action: on the one hand, training for work, occupational training and support for accessing the labour market; secondly, financial and technical support and consulting, if necessary, to local productive initiatives that may have possibilities of continuity and expansion.

A somewhat different experience is that of the Don Bosco Industrial Range project, at

San Salvador, El Salvador. This scheme is a clerical response, based on Salesian pedagogy, to the problems of poverty and marginalisation in some areas of the Salvadoran capital.

The Don Bosco Industrial Range is aimed at promoting the optimal and dynamic coming together of the requirements of authentic working communities and those of modern undertakings. Based on a strong co-operative spirit, it seeks to achieve the following:

• Striking a balance with its operational area
• Establishment of a commonality policy (common retraining approaches, homogeneous labour standards and training policies, regulation of personnel transfers)
• Commonality of services
• Complementation of catalogues on the basis of products
• Optimisation of trademarks and networks
• Optimisation of export structures
• Technological planning
• Centralisation of sales policies

The training and educational activities of the Don Bosco Range adhere to the "preventive postulate" of the Salesian Educational System. The decision to locate the project in one of the areas with the highest delinquency indexes of San Salvador clearly shows that it is bent on prevention. It lends assistance to the community by promoting the constructive capacity and energy of young people. The project is succeeding in the attainment of its goals and through the years it has managed to enlarge and improve its training and productive offer.