OECD LEED Trento Centre for Local Development

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OECD LEED Trento Centre for Local Development
8th CEI Summit Economic Forum Bratislava, Slovak
Republic, 23-24 November 2005 Peter Tatarko,
OECD
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OECD - A tool for Governments

• Born after World War II as the Organisation for
  European Economic Co-operation to coordinate the
  Marshall Plan
• Transformed in 1961 into the Organisation for
  Economic Co-operation and Development with
  trans-Atlantic and then global reach
• Today the OECD has 30 member countries, more than
  other 70 countries in direct contact (SEE
  including)
• Active programme with OECD non members through
  CCNM

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The OECD Secretariat - 2300 staff at Paris
headquarters and OECD Centers worldwide

• Works in two official languages English and
  French
• Staff members are international civil servants
• No quota system for national representation

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OECD LEED Trento Centre for Local Development

• Main goal is to contribute to local development
  capacity building in Central and Eastern Europe
  and South Eastern Europe with reference to
• Entrepreneurship and job creation
• Local governance and partnerships
• Social cohesion and social inclusion
• Evaluation
• LDN is a joint initiative with the CEI
• supporting the relationship between policy
  makers, local development practitioners and the
  scientific community in OECD member and non
  member countries
• bringing together committed policy-makers,
  researchers and practitioners from national and
  sub-national levels

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The Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs and Local
Development in the OECD (CFE)
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A glance on OECD LEEDs work

• Managing Plant Closures and Industrial
  Restructuring
• (a forthcoming OECD publication)
• Globalisation seems to be increasingly leading as
  powers and responsibilities are more and more
  ceded to
• Supra-national,
• sub-national and
• regional and local institutions.

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Preliminary findings from a forthcoming LEED
publication

• The publication seeks to continue the work
  started by the International Symposium
  Industrial Reconversion Initiatives Implemented
  by Actors in Civil Society, held in Montreal
  with the collaboration of the OECD LEED
  Programme.
• The publication will
• try to analyse specific cases of plant closures
  and industrial restructuring and
• put focus on courses of action that not only
  maximise company profit, but also foster social
  objectives, emphasising strategies for local
  employment creation.
• Case studies Fujitsu Microelectronics (UK),
  Falck Industries (Italy), Renault Vilvorde
  (Belgium), Angus and the Cité du Multimédia, both
  located in the city of Montreal, Quebec (Canada).

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A variety of effects on local economic
development and well-being

• loss of income
• loss of skillss demand
• loss of demand for supplies
• reduced maintenance of civil and transport
  infrastructure
• limited potential to re-invest
• loss of real estate value
• etc.

• Economic effects of plant closures and industrial
  restructuring
• Social effects of plant closures and industrial
  restructuring
• Ecological effects of plant closures and
  industrial restructuring

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What can be done at the local level listing
actions

• Public authorities must play a proactive role
• catalyst for private involvement, and an element
  of co-ordination
• Strong project leadership at the local level
• forceful guidance and a strong consensus around a
  project helps diminish time-frames and costs,
  while securing the necessary political will
• Community consultation seek to interact with
  unions and community representatives
• to arrive at a more successful restructuring
  strategy suitable to local needs and capacity
  diminishing social and political costs
• ./.

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What can be done at the local level listing
actions

• Establish a good communication strategy
• with employees, public authorities and the media
  to ensure support for the project
• Promote job placement and training schemes
• paying close attention to the existence of solid
  links with market needs
• Consider evaluating and conducting site
  decontamination
• brownfields resulting from factory closing
  constitute a significant obstacle to future
  economic development and well-being in the area.

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No case is the same

• Despite the fact of
• many different elements in explaining a plant
  closure and the success of a restructuring
  process and
• a wide array of legitimate goals sought by the
  different actors involved in these processes
• from the need for the company to increase
  efficiency and defend its business concerns, to
  equity and community development considerations

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Enlisting Social Partners in policy approaches

• It can be affirmed that a desire to enlist
  social partners when facing socio-economic
  changes caused by plant closures and industrial
  restructuring exists at all levels of government
• to make the process more politically manageable
• to avoid social dissatisfaction in the framework
  of modern democracies and the welfare state
• to promote a more effective process of economic
  revitalisation, by enlisting new actors with
  closer knowledge of local conditions.

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However Civil Society involvement and the
utilisation for public policy decision-making and
implementation is not a panacea foremployment
creation and plant closure management. An
adequate institutional capacity at the local
level is a precondition for it to be effective.
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Thank you.
Peter Tatarko Co-ordinator OECD LEED Trento
CentreVicolo San Marco, 1 38100 Trento
(Italy)tel [phone] www.Trento.oecd.org