LEGAL MIGRATION PATHWAYS ACROSS THE MEDITERRANEAN: ACHIEVEMENTS, OBSTACLES AND THE WAY FORWARD

Cinzia Alcidi, Nadzeya Laurentsyeva, Ahmad Wali Ahmad Yar
16/06/2019

This policy brief reviews the state of legal migration across the Mediterranean: it examines the existing migration links between the South Med countries and the EU, attempts to uncover the obstacles to legal migration and suggests ways to improve migration management. We argue that, if used strategically, even small-scale projects to foster legal migration can contribute to expanding legal migration opportunities and reducing irregular crossings in the longer term. However, this can only occur if projects are implemented in close cooperation with governments of the South Med countries and if they can contribute to capacity building of the national labour market and educational institutions. Further, given the prevalence of the family migration channel between the South Med and the EU, one way to foster legal migration is to leverage existing social networks, i.e. by engaging the South Med diaspora residing in the EU and supporting labour market integration of family migrants.

MICRO, SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN: A POLICY ROADMAP TO UNTAP THE POTENTIAL FOR JOB CREATION

Rym Ayadi, Rym Mouelhi, Emanuele Sessa, Heba Zaki
16/06/2019

The objective of this policy brief is to formulate a policy roadmap to untap the potential for employment creation by MSMEs in SEMCs, with a particular focus on Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia – building on the findings of four years of research on MSME development carried out under EMNES. MSMEs have an important role to play in creating much needed employment opportunities, but their development is currently hindered by a number of obstacles related to both the structural features of private sectors that remain underdeveloped in most SEMCs and specific issues, such as lack of access to finance, the high incidence of informality and low integration into global value chains.

The proposed policy road map provides a comprehensive framework to formulate, implement and monitor a fully-fledged MSME policy and to mainstream a ‘Think Small First’ principle in all policy areas relevant to the development of MSMEs. The policy road map is designed to complement the assessments of SME policies within SEMCs conducted by the OECD, EU and ETF (2008; 2014; 2018) and includes a discussion on the role that the EU can play to support its implementation.

POLICIES FOR LABOUR MATCHING WITHIN AND BETWEEN COUNTRIES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN REGION

Rym Ayadi, Emanuele Sessa
16/06/2019

The objective of this policy paper is to provide an overview of the current state of affairs in Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco and Tunisia regarding the formulation, implementation and monitoring of labour matching policies. To this purpose, a definition of labour matching policies encompassing both policies aimed at matching skills and jobs within countries – labour market policies – and between countries – labour migration policies – and a novel analytical framework for their assessment were proposed and used, to conduct interviews with key informants within institutions responsible for labour matching in the six countries considered. The survey results attest that the latter made substantial efforts to develop active labour market policies in recent years but, for the most part, these are not backed with an adequate allocation of funds, whilst well-functioning labour market information systems remain to be developed. The same cannot be said of labour migration policies, which are basically inexistent, except in those countries having signed Mobility Partnerships with the European Union – Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia – where national strategies for migration were developed and some migrant support measures implemented, albeit largely under the impulse and with the support of international donors. The paper concludes with the formulation of a policy road map for the development of a Euro-Mediterranean platform for the matching of skills and jobs between countries of origin and destination, and a supporting Euro-Mediterranean labour market information system.

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