5th HRD Ministerial Meeting

The 5th HRD Ministerial Meeting held 16-17 September 2010 in Beijing, P.R. China.

The APEC Human Resources Development Working Group (HRDWG) was established in 1990. Over the past 20 years, the HRDWG has held 4 ministerial meetings with the last meeting taking place in 2001.  During the 16th APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting in Lima, China proposed to host the 5th HRD Ministerial Meeting in Beijing in 2010. One year later China hosted the meeting where President Hu urged enhanced regional cooperation.

The unprecedented financial crisis has brought profound impact upon the world of work, resulting in increasing unemployment of working poor.  The 5th HRD Ministerial Meeting is intended to provide a good forum for the ministers to share knowledge and experience in their reponse to the economic and job crisis and deliberate over how to achieve inclusive growth through adopting employment-oriented macro policies, developing human resources and improving social safety nets. It is also intended to discuss how to enhance HRD cooperation across APEC economies, identifying priorities for work of the HRDWG in years to come and contributing to the goal “to support growth and prosperity in the Asia and Pacific Region through free and open trade and investment”.

Based on the dicussion at the 31st HRDWG meeting in Chicago and the consultation followed, the theme and sub-themes are set as follows:

Gender and cooperation among APEC economies are recommended as cross cutting issues to which due attendtion should be given during the above discussions.

Preparation of the subtheme and the Ministerial presentations products will be coordinated with the case studies being prepared for the HRD project on the economic crisis. 

The meeting's main outputs include :

1. Joint Ministerial Statement
   Purpose:  To reaffirm the leader’s declarations and statements on HRD and employment promotion, reiterate the mandates on APEC HRD put forth by the preceding HRD Ministerial meetings and the HR Capacity Building Summit Meeting in 2001, acknowledge APEC activities, summarize the consensus reached by the 5th Ministerial meeting, set guidelines for APEC long-term HRD and make recommendations to the leaders on how to address the post-crisis employment issues and support the inclusive growth strategy through improved HRD activities.
2. Action Plan
   Purpose: To provide a road map and identify HRDWG priorities to realize the objectives of Ministerial Joint Statement and the inclusive growth strategy, and recommend the future activities/projects to reinforce partnership and cooperation among APEC economies in the area of employment promotion, social protection and skills development. Due consideration should be given to the on-going projects and the emerging demands by the social dimensions of the crisis and economic globalization.
3. APEC Skills Development Promotion Project
   Purpose: To build capacity of vocational trainers of developing economies, along with policy dialogues, human exchanges and high-standard training material and skills qualifications development. The project answers the call of the 5th APEC HRD Ministerial Meeting to recognize the significant role of human resources development in advancing APEC growth strategy, particularly inclusive growth.
4. A Multi-year Technical Cooperation Project.
   Purpose: To answer the call of the Leaders to “develop a multi-year programme to build capacity for structural reform and SME develoment, employment creation and the development of social safety nets. It also responds to the on-going APEC efforts to work from multi-year plans. It serves as an important vehicle to translate the Joint Statement and the Action Plan into tangible activities and is aimed at promoting HRD cooperation among economies.
   

The Ministers will be supported by resources developed by recent APEC activities including: