As is well known, the supply of training does not usually create its own demand. Clearly, therefore, training provision for the poor has been powerfully shaped by the nature of the demand for training among targeted groups, in particular in the informal sector. Lack of effective demand is a key reason for both the limited training provision for the poor (and hence outputs and impacts) in most countries as well as the overall failure of national training systems to reorient their activities in support of the poor.
4.1 The potential for training interventions There is a tendency to over-estimate the extent of self-employment among the poor in both the urban and rural informal sectors as well as the scope for improving productive independent economic activity. If anything, this tendency has increased in recent years with the emergence of 'private sector development' as the major long-medium term objective of economic reform programmes, particularly among donors. However, the fact remains that most informal sector activity will continue to be "the last resort for the desperate rather than a panacea for employment problems" (ILO, 1997:).
Breman eloquently describes the situation of the urban poor in Gujarat, India. In situations such as these, where "the great mass of people" are in wage employment and "have no prospect of improving their position" (Breman, 1995: 97), there is virtually no demand among the poor for formal training. In particular, for those at the bottom of rural society, the formal sector is an "impregnable fortress". With very simple technology and an abundant supply of cheap labour, not only can workers be trained at minimal cost on the job, but there are no incentives to invest in more skill-intensive technologies. In such brutal labour regimes, the degrading effects are such that employers regularly replenish their workforces with new recruits from rural areas.
It is clear that the informal sectors in other countries have much higher proportions of self-employed labour and tend, therefore, to be less exploitative. However, the value of detailed anthropological research of the kind undertaken by Breman is that it highlights the immense and complex array of social, economic and political problems that have to be surmounted in order to achieve sustainable reductions in mass poverty.
Another key development in India and other countries is that "the organised sector is disorganising itself" precisely in order to exploit cheap labour to the greatest extent possible. This process of "informalisation of the formal sector" is likely to become more pervasive as the benefits of non-regulation exceed those from regulation. Probably, the greatest training need in these situations is to develop the capacity of specific groups of poor workers to organise themselves in order to limit the degree of exploitation they are subjected to, in particular by increasing wages and generally improving conditions of work. The success of the Self-Employed Women's Association in Ahmedabad is widely cited in this regard. However, initiatives to replicate this type of project do not appear to have been widespread.
EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING PAPERS 43 Learning to change: Skills development among the economically vulnerable and socially excluded in developing countries Paul Bennell Employment and Training Department International Labour Office Geneva First published 1999
To learn more about this author, visit International Labour Organization's Website.
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