On 9 February 2016, the European partners assembled at Airbus in Hamburg for the CHANGE project kick-off meeting. It was attended by 14 company and trade union representatives from eight EU countries, as well as the European umbrella organisation industriAll Europe.
The European demographic project gathers speed
First partner meeting held at Airbus in Hamburg on 9 February 2016
The event was coordinated and prepared by the project sponsor Arbeit und Leben Bielefeld, together with the IG Metall executive board based in Frankfurt. This first meeting for the partners proved extremely fruitful, as 11 trade unions from the metal industry will now help implement the project by the end of 2017, instead of the six originally planned. The fact that so many different trade unions and eight countries are involved means that the project will cover approx. 90% of employees working in the European aerospace industry. Similarly, all parties are equally committed to ensuring that the project is successful and produces consistent results. This makes it vital to ensure that everyone is fully informed of the objectives, content and procedures for the project and that their respective sectoral and industrial policy interests are taken into account when it is implemented.
Key outcomes of the meeting:
- The project partners were able to get to know each other, both personally and in terms of their policies
- They agreed on common interests and objectives
- Agreements were reached concerning the concrete action plan and milestones were set for 2017
- It was possible to start sharing information across Europe on the current situation and employment-specific issues that will affect the sector in the future
- On-site participation and involvement of industrial representative bodies (European survey)
- Preparation of information on the structure of the sector at national and European level
- Arrangements for project-related information and PR initiatives
- Preparations for the kick-off meeting in March 2016
Over the next few weeks, work will focus on the preparation of the industrial survey on “Human resources, the need for skilled labour and demographics” and the development of national sector profiles. The documents used for this task (questionnaire and criteria for sector overviews) were explained. They are currently being translated into all the relevant languages. Both of these measures will serve to identify more effectively the need for action and concrete starting points for work and employment policy initiatives in the national sectors.The project management team (Arbeit und Leben Bielefeld and the IGM executive board) will continue to work on these topics until the kick-off meeting in March 2016 and put forward appropriate proposals for political priorities for our continued work together.