OECS TO DISCUSS REGIONAL LABOUR MARKET INFORMATION ISSUES

Castries, June 6- The OECS Secretariat will convene a two day meeting of Permanent Secretaries and Labour Commissioners from OECS Ministries of Labour, from 6th – 7th June 2013 in St Lucia.

This is the first time OECS Labour Commissioners will meet regarding the OECS Labour Market Information System.

Discussions will cover various issues confronting OECS-Departments of Labour (DOL) in setting up the OECS Labour Market Information System (LMIS) in their respective countries.

The overallobjective of the meeting is to Identify and review challenges in establishing a national LMIS in OECS member countries paying special attention to the computerisation of Labour Departments.

This unprecedented meting of Labour Commissioners has received support from with support from the 10th European Development Fund (EDF) as well as the International Labour Organisation’s Decent Work Team and Office for the Caribbean.

Mr. Sean Curtis Mathurin, the Coordinator for the OECS Labour Market Information System project advises that Income and employment indicators are critical in analysing economic and social progress at both the macro and the micro levels: “Without these, no meaningful assessment of development performance is complete. Therefore it is critical for OECS Member Countries to have timely information on labour and income aspects of this process including; job losses and job creation, aggregate shifts in the allocation of labour between sectors and occupations, vacancies and job seekers, the quality of (new) jobs, the social costs of the transition process -including changes in income levels- and other information indicating how businesses and people are faring”.

The support from the European Union in convening the meeting of Permanent Secretaries and Labour Commissioners from OECS Ministries of Labour, is being provided under the project, Economic Integration and Trade of the OECS Region.

That project, which is being administered by the OECS Secretariat, is being financed out of resources from the 10th EDF regional programme, and seeks to contribute to the establishment of the OECS Economic Union as a single economic and financial space through the development of a harmonized policy, legislative, regulatory and administrative framework, and the enhancement of the institutional capacity and export competitiveness of OECS economies.

<