Regional sharing and mutual reinforcement workshop on public-private partnerships in vocational training in Africa

Download the report of the Regional Sharing Workshop (French version)

by clicking on this link

Although these partnerships are part of the reforms, they are still not considered sufficiently effective by a large majority of training stakeholders, and it seems useful to organise an intense sharing of approaches, experiences and innovative ideas on the subject of PPPs in order to contribute to strengthening the current dynamics.

In this spirit and in order to deepen this question, IIEP-UNESCO Dakar, the Luxembourg Agency for Development Cooperation (LuxDev) and the Institut de la Francophonie pour l'éducation et la formation (IFEF) took the initiative of joining forces to organize a sharing and strengthening workshop on this theme, which brought together key public and private stakeholders from 18 African countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Chad, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Djibouti, Guinea, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, DR Congo, Senegal, Tunisia and Togo. The workshop was also supported by UNESCO's Better Education for Africa's Rise (BEAR) programme and the European Commission's VET-Toolbox.

Discover the agenda of this 3 days workshop (in French) by clicking on this link.

More than 120 participants took part in the three working days, including 80 key players in vocational training (VT) in Africa, with experience and expertise from the public sector (representatives of ministries in charge of vocational training, public TVET financing and management institutions, managers of public training centres...) and the private sector (representatives of employers' organisations, professional groups, craft federations, consular chambers).

The workshop was also attended by the main pan-African and international networks/organisations in vocational training: FAR, RAFPRO, REA, UEMOA (CCMEFP), UNEVOC, as well as the main Development Partners and specialised bodies involved in vocational training: AFD, AfDB, German Cooperation (GIZ), Belgian Cooperation (Enabel), Canadian Cooperation (AMC), Swiss Cooperation (SDC), European Training Foundation (ETF), ILO, UNIDO, European Union.

Discover the list of participants by clicking on this link

The core theme of public-private partnerships in vocational training in Africa was first presented and discussed by all participants in order to agree on the definitions, main concepts, issues and challenges of PPPs in the African context.

The reflection was then organised around six in-depth topics, focusing on the adaptation of vocational training provision to the needs of the economy on the one hand, and on the steering and governance of vocational training on the other.

Prior to the workshop, participants from the 18 African countries were invited to produce short information sheets on concrete experiences conducted in their countries in relation to the 6 in-depth topics.

All the sessions of the workshop were introduced by different international experts, from the continent but also from Europe and North America, who then facilitated the discussions of the thematic groups.

Discover the summary (in French) of the experts' introductory presentations by clicking on this link

Finally, all the exchanges, sharing and group work of the workshop were systematically captured by a team of rapporteurs.

A comprehensive report was produced to provide, in the form of a reference document, all the elements produced for and during the Dakar regional workshop, based on the analytical treatment of the multiple sources of information mentioned above.