On November 8, 2022, Innoskart Entrepreneurship Development Nonprofit Kft. held the final communication conference of the eDIGISTARS project. In cooperation with the Central Transdanubian Regional Innovation Agency and numerous domestic and international experts, Innoskar supported the most vulnerable labor market group with certification and competitive knowledge training within the framework of the eDIGISTARS Danube regional project (eDigiStars – Interreg Danube (interreg-danube.eu) the acquisition of digital knowledge of the over 50 age group.
The closing event in November began with a welcome from the managing director of Innoskart, who is also the Managing Partner of EDIGISTARS.
The “Seniors are new on the field! | Or employees over 50, self-employed, job seekers and their opportunities on the labor market” was presented by Nóra Kudari, representing the Association of Informatics, Telecommunications and Electronics Enterprises. In his presentation, he emphasized that as a result of the demographic explosion, the age group over 50 has become the most significant and broadest segment of the domestic labor market.The constantly changing labor market requires a highly qualified workforce, which must be maintained at the necessary level with training that follows technical changes in order to be competitive. By 2025, the number of daily working hours performed by digitization solutions will reach the working time that can be efficiently filled by human work. Evaluating the statistical data, it can be concluded that by 2050, the proportion of employees older than 50 will rise from 37% to 50%, while old-age dependency will rise from 30% to 50%.Together with the extension of the retirement age, this results in the extension of the time spent in the employment relationship, thus also the extension of the employment relationship of those over 50 years of age. As a result of the COVID-19 epidemic, the return to the labor market of people in their fifties who have been forced out of the labor market is currently only possible with education that follows the development. However, companies do not organize internal further training, so this task must be provided to external educational institutions. In the lectures following the presentations, the Slovenian, Bulgarian, and Serbian partners participating in the event presented on similar topics, highlighting that the same trends can be observed in them as well, partly as a result of the COVID-19 epidemic situation. The speakers were the following: Žunko, PRIZMA (Slovenia), Svetlana Doncheva, BIA (Bulgaria), Rumena Butseva, Natalija NEA (Bulgaria), – Irena Vukajlovic, Agency Spektar Banja Luka (Republic of Serbia).
How long is your LifeLong Learning cover? | “Or the development of skills and competence of people over 50 in practice” was presented by Szilvia Rákosi on behalf of the Neumann János Computer Science Society (NJSZT). He emphasized that the proportion of employed women in the digital labor market is very low, barely 10% in Hungary today.Only the most capable of the 50th generation who left the domestic educational environment obtained a higher education. With the change of regime (1990), further training of the unemployed in the IT and language fields was provided by the regional employment centers, primarily in disadvantaged areas. In 2012, the development of digital, foreign language competences and the support of workplace training started with European Union funding. The training opportunities provided by the GINOP, TÁMOP, and VEKOP projects implemented at that time proved to be useful.
The event ended with a panel discussion related to the above topics, moderated by former expert Gál Körmendy. Interlocutors Szilvia Rákosi (NJSZT), Simona Trip, ACTA (Romania), Kateřina Kormskova, DEX IC (Czech Republic), Balázs Mahler, Minerva ’90 Kft. (Hungary), Mateja Pihlar, Maribor Adult Education Center (Slovenia) and Aleksandar Vukovic, They were RARS (Republic of Serbia). What was said at the closing event is also closely related to the Regions 4Food project dealing with agricultural digitization. In this international cooperation, the importance of education in the digital transition of agriculture is a fundamental principle. This challenge is more manageable for the younger generations, but it is precisely the age group over 50 who has more difficulties in acquiring new IT skills and digital solutions. The same tendency also complicates the generational change due in southern Transdanubian and domestic agriculture.
The Regions 4Food project is implemented with the co-financing of the European Regional Development Fund and the Hungarian State.