In Albania, VET is the key to closing the skills gap

Keywords: Albania, VET, employment, governance, migration

Albania’s Torino Process report reveals positive trends in the country’s activity and unemployment rates, particularly when measured against its Western Balkan peers, and the economy continued to grow over the last years. COVID-19 pandemic is expected to negatively impact the economy and labour market in 2020 with a GDP contraction of 4.8% and surge in unemployment from 11.6% in 2019 to 14.9% in 2020. However, Albania will reume its growth in 2021 and with the services sector driving this growth, it is essential to invest more in skills and training to ensure people benefit from the new employment opportunities. The government has prioritized  the skills mismatch as the country prepares for the next round of EU support through the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance 2021-2027.

Job growth is one of the strongest in the Western Balkans region, with the number of job offers registered by the Public Employment Service having more than tripled over five years (2013 to 2018 – from 16,175 to 61,391). The majority of these jobs require skills specific to both secondary education and vocational training (ISCO major groups 4-8). In Albania only nine years of education are compulsory and although early school leaving rates have fallen the percentage is still almost double the EU 2020 benchmark. Moreover, only 18.2% of upper secondary students are enrolled on vocational courses, and only 16.1% of these (3,391 students), are women. This contrasts strongly with other countries in the region (in 2017 Bosnia and Herzegovina had 75.9% of secondary students in VET, Serbia had 74.4%, Montenegro 67.9%, North Macedonia 59.6% and Kosovo 52.6%). There are also few opportunities for adult learning in Albania.

The report points to several factors for the low participation in VET:

• Unattractiveness of courses, particularly for women
• Lack of financial support
• Limited access to high-quality learning resources
• Courses insufficiently adapted to the job market
• A negative perception of the value and status of vocational training
• Low educational attainment, which prevents students from enrolling on and completing vocational courses

According to a study funded by Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 52% of the Albanian population aged 18 to 40 intends to migrate from Albania. Against the background of drastically declining age cohorts, better educational planning and the reorganisation of the network of vocational schools and training centres are seen as important means of making VET more attractive and creating more opportunities for inclusion. A major overhaul of the governance structure for VET is under way, turning the National Employment Service into a National Agency for Employment and Skills, which will take over the management of all public VET institutions. A cornerstone of the strategy is to set up Multifunctional Centres that would cater for both students and adult learners.

The ETF recommends: 1. Monitoring and analysing early school leaving; 2. Improving educational planning to attract more learners; 3. Creating more opportunities for adult education; 4. Strengthening professional development of vocational teachers; 5. Equipping all schools with basic learning resources; 6. Implementing the Albanian Qualifications Framework (quality control across state, private and not-for-profit providers); 7. Involving social partners more in VET; 8. Strengthening work-based learning; and 9. Enhancing career guidance. Together, a better provision of VET and orientation of potential learners could make a significant difference in narrowing the gap between the skills people have and those needed in the workplace.