In the context of the discussions around the United Nation’s Global Compact for Migration, the idea of Global Skills Partnerships has emerged as a way to associate migration and skills development for the mutual benefit of origin and destination countries, as well as migrants themselves. This concept is not new – it builds on a variety of bilateral skills mobility partnerships already piloted and tested by many OECD countries. However, these programmes have generally remained limited in scope and remain the exception rather than the rule.
This edition of Migration Policy Debates looks at the reasons why existing Skills Mobility Partnership have not been taken up more widely. It proposes concrete measures for making them work more globally: involving employers in both programme design and validation of migrants’ skills; acknowledging the diversity of approaches and situations across countries and sectors in how skills development and migration are combined; creating one-stop-shops for promoting skills mobility partnerships, supporting their implementation and conducting evaluation.
