New e-Skills for Jobs campaign to start in Romania to promote ICT among Europeans

The e-Skills for Jobs campaign will run this year in 30 EU countries, Romania included, to raise citizens’ awareness to improve their command of information and communication technology (ICT) skills for work, announced the European Commission.

The eSkills ambassador for jobs in 2014 is Varujan Pambuccian.

The campaign will inform students, unemployed people, ICT professionals and SMEs about the vast range of opportunities that ICT-related jobs present.

While Europe struggles with a prolonged economic downturn, e-Skills are more essential than ever to help get Europe’s economy back on its feet. People with strong e-Skills will play a central role in making Europe an innovative and competitive environment, according to the European Commission.

“The biggest worry for me is youth unemployment, which in some member states has reached 64 percent. (…) With the help of the Digital Agenda, we expect to create over 1 million jobs in ICT for young people,” said Neelie Kroes, VP of the European Commission and Commissioner for the Digital Agenda, during the Future Communities//Open Innovation Fair that took place in Bucharest in October 2013.

One of the first key activities during the campaign is Get Online Week, a pan-European event organized by Telecentre Europe on 24-30 March, to get new users online and improve their digital skills for working life. Two major events are also foreseen during the campaign linked to the Greek and Italian EU Presidencies.

The European Commission has selected DIGITALEUROPE and European Schoolnet to deliver the e-Skills for Jobs 2014 campaign.

The campaign is coordinated by DIGITALEUROPE and European Schoolnet in conjunction with hundreds of national and pan-European partners including European Centre for Women and Technology, JA-YE, Telecentre Europe and many major IT industry partners.

It comes under the umbrella of the European Commission’s Grand Coalition for Digital Jobs, an EU-wide multi-stakeholder partnership helping to address a shortfall in the number of European citizens with ICT professional skills, and to exploit the employment creation potential of ICT.