Observation (CEACR) - adopted 1995, published 83rd ILC session (1996)

1. The Committee notes the Government's report for the period ending June 1994. The Government indicates that due to lack of full information on the employment situation, it has been able, until recent years, to implement only fragmentary measures of the employment policy. It affirms, however, that it is now convinced of the urgency of formulating a global and dynamic employment policy as an integral part of the reforms undertaken at economic level. It mentions the initiatives taken in this regard, particularly the ILO multidisciplinary consultative mission on employment, which took place in October-November 1994 and of which it is awaiting the report.

2. In addition, the Committee received comments and information on recent developments from the ILO multidisciplinary team in Addis Ababa. The above-mentioned mission was followed by a national tripartite seminar in September 1995 which reaffirmed the need to formulate an employment policy on the basis of the elements set out in the ILO mission report. The Committee notes, in addition, that the Government has made an application for technical cooperation for a mission charged with formulating an employment policy programme in early 1996.

3. The Committee notes with interest the information which demonstrates the complementarity between standards and technical cooperation in the framework of the new structures established by the ILO. It is bound to encourage the Government to pursue its efforts, with ILO technical support, to formulate and apply "as a major goal, an active policy designed to promote full, productive and freely chosen employment", in accordance with Article 1 of the Convention. It hopes that the next report will show progress in this direction and will contain information as detailed as possible on the effect given to all the provisions of the Convention (reference may be made to the questions raised in the direct request of 1994). Bearing in mind the aforementioned observations of the ILO multidisciplinary team which stress the acute nature of employment problems and poverty in the context of a strategy of liberalization of the economy and privatization and the vigorous application of a stabilization and structural adjustment programme, the Committee draws attention, furthermore, to the requirement under Article 2, to decide on and keep under review employment policy measures "within the framework of a coordinated economic and social policy" and under Article 3, concerning the consultation and cooperation of the persons affected (representatives of employers and workers, representatives of other sectors of the active population, such as persons working in the rural and informal sectors).