The Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean (PAM) and the UN – International Labour Organisation (ILO) have initiated a series of discussions leading to a more structured platform of cooperation on job creation and migratory flows in fragile contexts, among other related issues. PAM and ILO have been collaborating for a number of years in the framework of the joint activities within the UN Inter-Agency Cluster on Trade and Productive Capacity, which has hosted several PAM 2nd Standing Committee meetings in Geneva.
PAM Secretary General, Amb. Sergio Piazzi, hosted a meeting, at the PAM Headquarters in Malta, on Tuesday 27 October 2015, with Mr. Donato Kiniger-Passigli, Coordinator of the “Fragile States and Disaster Response Group” of the ILO. Preliminary details for future PAM – ILO cooperation, including, amongst others, an operative MoU and a parliamentary meeting in Geneva, in 2016, dedicated to forced migration, were discussed.
Furthermore, the creation in Malta of a Knowledge Hub on Forced Migration and Employment for the Mediterranean was also explored together with Dr. Alberto Zucconi, Director of the World University Consortium and Dr. Francis M.E. La Ferla, former WHO Adviser for Europe, who also attended the meeting. PAM, together with the ILO, the Person Centered Approach Institute and the World University Consortium, have agreed to working in partnership towards the possible establishment of the Knowledge Hub.
The initiative will act as an observatory on Mediterranean countries´ regulatory frameworks for refugees and employment in countries of origin, transit and destination. The project will also offer counseling to employers and workers organizations, business service providers, civil servants, public administrative officials, local institutions and community leaders on issues pertaining to employment and refugees.
A meeting was also held with the President of the Republic of Malta, H.E. Marie Louise Coleiro Preca, to whom the Knowledge Hub was presented and explained in light of the unprecedented proportions of the migration flows towards the European continent, where member states will have to deal in both the short and long term with the presence of refugees and asylum seekers, in view of the complex processes of their integration / cohabitation in the social texture and labour markets of the receiving countries.