0.    INTRODUCTION

These Terms of Reference (ToR) are published in the framework of the request-based Technical Assistance Facility of the “Team Europe Initiative for Opportunity-driven Skills and Vocational Education and Training (TEI OP-VET)” funded by the European Union in the context of its strategy “Global Gateway”, aiming to identify sectoral individual experts to conduct short- and medium-term missions in their domain of expertise. These missions will be partially organized in the countries of intervention of the TEI OP-VET in Sub-Saharan Africa countries.

1.    BACKGROUND INFORMATION AND PROJECT CONTEXT

1.1   Context of the Sub-Saharan Africa labour market

Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are home to more than 1 billion people, half of whom will be under 25 years old by 2050. The region is composed of 48 low, lower-middle, upper-middle, and high-income countries, 19 of which are fragile or conflict-affected. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO) forecasts, SSA countries will need to create about 18-20 million new jobs per year between now and 2035 to absorb the growing employable population. While most African countries experienced impressive growth since the turn of the millennium, pre-Covid estimates place job creation at around a quarter of the needs. In the last years, economic growth in SSA is set to decelerate from 3.7% % in 2022 to 2.8 % in 2023, as a result of a slowdown in global growth, rising inflation exacerbated by the war in Ukraine, the impact of climate change, a tightening in global financial conditions, and the rising risk of debt distress (World Bank, 2024).

Looking at labour market trends in SSA, the unemployment rate in the region increased from 5.7 % in 2019 to 6.4 % in 2022. The youth unemployment rate (15-24 years) in SSA is even higher, as ILO estimated it to be 12,4 % in 2022. Although this trend is similar to that of the global unemployment rate over the same period, it does not fully capture the lack of productive and qualitative employment opportunities for much of the labour force: increasing informality and working poverty paint a more accurate picture of the situation than the unemployment figures. New estimates suggest that the rate of the employed population in informal employment has increased to 87.3 % in 2022 in SSA, especially among women and vulnerable groups. The informality of employment inhibits access to social protection and fundamental rights at work. Rising costs of living and inflation threaten to worsen working poverty and reduce the ability of workers and their households to earn enough to sustain themselves above the poverty line4 (ILO, World Employment and Social Outlook, Trends, 2023). The rate of youth not in employment, education, or training (NEET) in 2022 was estimated at 25.7 %, with 31.4 % for women NEET. Cultural and religious factors still represent a barrier to education and employment for women, especially in rural areas. The situation of young people with disabilities (PwD) is particularly precarious. They have less access to quality education and their unemployment rate is higher than their peers.

From a business perspective SSA countries offer investment opportunities across various sectors (e.g. digital, climate and energy, health, etc.). Each country may have its own unique set of challenges and opportunities. But a key challenge for investors is, among other factors to find the skills they need for their investment (African Economic Outlook 2023). Skills shortages include technical, scientific, and managerial capabilities – and more and more digital skills. Moreover, the vocational education and training (VET) ecosystem does not yet adequately address these challenges (e.g., limited access to education and training and underdeveloped support systems). Joint action by the educational sector and industry stakeholders is needed to formulate effective initiatives for current and future workforce development to address the skills gaps. Empowering the labour force in SSA countries with the skills required to benefit from investments made in their industry will not only enhance employability, but also create pathways for social and economic advancement (e.g., digitalisation, transformation to a green economy). A major challenge in the decades to come will be to match the employment expectations of large numbers of young Africans, with the reality of decent jobs available and their qualifications to access them. This gap can only be addressed by increasing the pool of decent jobs linked to a just (economic) transition. It cannot be addressed by VET only, which needs to follow job opportunities that market dynamics create. Also, the Africa-Europe Global Gateway Investment Package (GGIP) will bring business and job opportunities in this regard. This is in line with a similar paradigm shift with the African policy promoting to boost employment.

1.2   Relevance of the TEI OP-VET

During the European Union-African Union (EU-AU) Summit in February 2022, the Africa Europe GGIP of EUR 150 billion was announced[1]. Through this Africa Investment Initiative, the European Commission is supporting the creation of decent jobs, with VET as an important enabler: stimulating investment, trade and private sector development while contributing to the green and digital transition. The Team Europe Initiative for Opportunity-driven Skills and Vocational Education and Training (TEI OP-VET) was presented as a key element of the GGIP. 

For this program, TEI members defined ‘opportunity-driven skills and VET’ (OP-VET) as reverse engineering of vocational education and training programs - starting from concrete and decent employment opportunities created by investments, trade, economic diversification, value chain development and other market dynamics. The approach of the Action acknowledges that skills development must be embedded in sectoral or industrial systems and shaped by the ways work is organized at the workplace, connecting demand and supply side actions, with a strong focus on private sector cooperation. Skills and VET provision therefore need to be an integral part of investment and value chains development strategies that promote employment in Africa guided by Africa-Europe investment initiatives, with particular attention to the GG.

The TEI OP-VET program aims to strengthen the training offer in Sub-Saharan Africa and orient it towards decent employment opportunities in selected sectors and value chains under Africa-Europe investment initiatives, including the Global Gateway Investment Package (GGIP). 

This 75M € project is being implemented for a period of 60 months, starting from March 2024 until February 2029, by a consortium of European partners, namely:

·        Enabel (Belgium)

·        Expertise France (EF, France)

·         Finnish National Agency for Education (EDUFI, Finland)

·         Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH (GIZ, Germany)

The program is structured into 3 main components:

·        Pillar 1 (Request-based Technical Assistance Facility) – EF-led but with the active participation of all consortium agencies

o   Result 1: Decent employment opportunities in (sub-) sectors and value chains, notably those responding to EU Global Gateway priorities, are identified and assessed at country level.

o   Result 2: Improved capacities of VET actors for development of VET services relevant to identified decent employment opportunities. 

·        Pillar 2 (Organization of regional events promoting PPPs in VET) - Edufi-led

·       Pillar 3 (Call for proposals of projects supporting the opportunity-driven approach in VET) - GIZ-led

1.3   The Technical Assistance Facility

The Technical Assistance (TA) Facility coordinated by Expertise France is running from Q1 2025 until Q4 2028 and aims at supporting European Union Delegations (EUDs) and European Union (EU) Member States to better (re)orient their sector-specific or skills, VET projects/programs in sub-Saharan Africa towards concrete employment opportunities (paradigm shift from supply to opportunity-driven approach) notably those created by the GGIP. 

The TA Facility is a request-based mechanism and consists of two steps, which will be addressed jointly or separately based on the needs:

Step 1: To assess and identify employment opportunities in (sub-) sectors and/or value chains (Result 1) supported by the Global Gateway and other EU-Africa flagship initiatives, with the involved private sector partners and authorities. Possible activities of the Facility under this result include an analysis of value chains and/or sub-sectors with highest needs and employment potential across countries in SSA. The assessment will be closely linked to existing and/or planned interventions under the GGIP (and other flagship initiatives).

 Step 2: To formulate recommendations for better conceptualisation, implementation and monitoring of responsive skills and VET. Building on the support provided under Result 1, or on similar work done by other partners and stakeholders, the TA Facility will analyse the existing VET offer in a given sector and formulate recommendations and tools targeted towards VET stakeholders to adjust their training provision to be more responsive to the private sector needs and job opportunities created by the Global Gateway.

This call for sectoral experts aims to build a pool of experts to conduct short- and medium-term assignments in the different sectoral priority areas of the Global Gateway strategy (i.e., digital, climate and energy, transport, health), who will be closely working with VET and labour market experts. 

Selected experts’ profiles will be added to a database and could be contacted throughout the implementation period of the TA Facility to apply for specific calls for CVs launched in the framework of a specific request/mission, responding to expressed needs for support.