Funding & Sponsers

The European Union (EU)– Egyptian TVET Reform Programme is a cornerstone of the ambitious national modernisation approach of Egypt. As a long-standing partner country for the EU and of the European-Mediterranean development cooperation and community, Egypt is in a key position for the successful implementation of the Barcelona process. This is true under a political, cultural, commercial and geographical perspective. The economic and social situation in Egypt is characterised inter alia by an ongoing transition process and privatisation, centralistic bureaucracy, scarcity of skilled labour and a technology-gap, influencing the competitiveness of Egyptian enterprises. On the other hand the country shows stable economic growth, has a highly capable business community and vast market potentials e.g. in sectors like LNG, (petro-)chemicals, tourism, ICT, food-production, building & construction, energy and security etc. At the same time the Egyptian Government (GoE) is faced with the major socio-economic challenge of satisfying the quantitative and qualitative needs in education and training for a fast growing population. In future 1.5 million and even more new entrants per annum will ask for training and jobs. To train such numbers with the required quality is possible only in utilising capacities of the production system and to absorb them at the labour market economic growth has to be raised significantly. Therefore the GoE has decided to start a comprehensive national modernisation programme. The political target is to create some 4.5 million jobs within six years and to improve the standard of living. Industrial growth is targeted to increase by 5.5% p.a. combined with a significantly improved competitiveness by higher quality. Two pillars of the national initiative are the Industrial Modernisation Programme (IMP) and the reform of the National TVET System (NTRP). The latter includes an appropriate conducive political environment and an effective backup structure. Within the framework of the National Indicative Programme 2005-2006, EC assistance is given to both, the IMP and the NTRP, pursuing the EC targets to support economic transition and development, to promote education and to assist Egypt on its way to a knowledge society and strong partner in the European-Mediterranean collaboration. Furthermore the World Bank assisted SDP and the German funded MKI aside of others are also part of TVET modernisation in Egypt. In using a participatory bottom-up approach of PPP, the TVET reform programme is aiming to shift from a centralised, segmented and supply-driven TVET system to a decentralised, demand led and competency oriented one. Furthermore the National TVET Modernisation Programme has to be seen in close conjunction with other donor projects and in particular with the other European assisted programmes like the above mentioned IMP.