Welcome speech by Telecentre Europe's Managing Director Gabriel Rissola at TEAC 2015 in Belgrade.

1. TELECENTRE EUROPE
8th Annual Conference
From digital inclusion to digital empowerment
GABRIEL RISSOLA
Managing Director
Telecentre Europe
Belgrade, 24 Sept 2015

2. E-SOCIETY: the DSM reductionism
 Riga declaration on e-Inclusion (2006)
 Digital Agenda (2010)  Pillar VI: Enhancing digital literacy, skills and inclusion
 Grand Coalition for Digital Jobs (2013)
 e-Skills manifesto (2015)
 Digital Single Market (2015)  Unlocking the benefits of e-services and
advancing digital skills:
“People need the right digital skills to find jobs and capture opportunities. They
also stand to benefit from high-quality online public services in an inclusive e-
society—which could also potentially save billions of euros per year”

3. E-SOCIETY: the DSM reductionism
• Juncker’s focus: Jobs, Growth, Fairness and Democratic Change
• e-Society: just Government/market-driven e-services?
• Digital skills: only to behave as educated consumers/citizens?
Our position: we want digitally-empowered Europeans
 Inclusive digital literacy still needed
 Citizens as agents of change, from digital consumers to prosumers
 Democratic change: digitally boosted, bottom-up e-participation

4. SKILLS FOR EMPLOYABILITY: a paradigm shift
Ms Thyssen, European Commissioner for Employment, Social
Affairs, Skills and Labour Mobility:
“Early next year, the European Commission will present a new EU wide Skills Agenda.
This will focus action to help more people to develop and upgrade their skills,
including basic skills such as literacy, numeracy and digital competences. It will set
out measures on how we can better anticipate skills needs and improve the
transparency and recognition of qualifications.”
(17 Sept 2015)

5. SKILLS FOR EMPLOYABILITY: a paradigm shift
 Education to meet labour market needs:
 VET, Adult learning, Skills and Qualifications moved from DG EAC to DG EMPL
 Adult learning now focused on improving basics skills, obtaining new
qualifications, up-skilling, or re-skilling for employment
 The EC committed to helping all EU countries create flexible, high quality adult
learning systems
 Digital skills under the forthcoming European Skills Agenda
 Youth unemployment tackled through the Youth Employment Initiative
 Measures to promote entrepreneurship (including a competence framework)

6. TE ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2015
• Unite IT:
• Skills and Jobs: Education and training | Youth employability
• Inclusion: Vulnerable groups | Gender equality
• Social innovation
• e-EUROPA:
• e-Participation in theory and in practice
• Community:
• Opportunities for telecentres offered by the IT industry
• Official launch of “I-LINC” stakeholder platform on youth employability
• Knowledge world café on sustainability and funding

7. E n j o y t h e c o n f e r e n c e !