About ILO/Cinterfor

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ORIGINS

 

CINTERFOR, originated from the Seventh Conference of American ILO Member States, held in Buenos Aires in 1961, in response to a proposal made to the ILO to establish a center for the exchange of experiences, based on research, documentation and dissemination of vocational training activities.

In the early sixties, most American countries faced the need to increase the general level of their manpower training in order to improve the quantity and quality of the enterprises' performance and the workers' living conditions. Given this situation, many countries (Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay, among others) began, with technical assistance from the ILO, actions aimed at the creation of new vocational training services, based on a tight collaboration with workers and employers, and dedicated to the training of apprentices and adult workers.

The organization of these services, the preparation and publication of training programs, the preparation of education personnel and the study of necessary installations and equipment represented a great effort in research and a good deal of adaptation among each of these countries. Consequently they considered it highly desirable that the national services committed in this effort used the accumulated experience of  other countries and participate in a necessary coordination of activities to be developed in America.

Facing this situation and considering the general resolution concerning vocational training adopted in the Seventh Conference held in Buenos Aires, it was decided on that occasion to recommend to the ILO the creation of an Inter-American Research and Documentation Centre on Vocational Training, which would promote a permanent cooperation between national units in charge of vocational training. As part of this recommendation, it was pointed out that the Centre should have as its main duties the gathering of all documentation related to vocational training aspects and, to that effect, the establishment of necessary contacts with all specialized organizations; disseminate this documentation in an appropriate way among interested national organizations; implement, at the organizations' request, all kind of research related to the general and technical organization of vocational training; prepare didactic training material, according to the needs or requests of interested entities.

Then, in 1963 CINTERFOR was created as a technical unit of the International Labour Organization (ILO), with headquarters in Montevideo . It acts as the coordinating nucleus of a system composed of vocational training institutions and entities of the ILO Member States from America and Spain.

The Technical Committee of Cinterfor, made up of representatives of governments and employers' and workers' organizations, together with the Director General of the ILO, determines the Centre's plan of activities and budget.

By nature, it is the coordinator and instrument of technical cooperation among its member institutions; it encourages and promotes the development of human resource training institutions, by means of the exchange of experiences among them, based on studies and research investigations, information and documentation, as well as the transfer of methodologies and vocational training technologies; it contributes to the further training of managers, technical and teaching personnel of regional institutions. To this end, besides the Director, Cinterfor counts with a group of experts on different vocational training areas, and has available a network of specialists to turn to for the realization of specific studies and projects.

 

 

The Inter-American Centre for Knowledge Development in Vocational Training (ILO/Cinterfor)
Avda. Uruguay 1238 - Montevideo - Uruguay - Tel: (5982) 908 6023 - 902 0557 - 908 0545 - Fax: (5982) 902 1305
webmaster@cinterfor.org.uy

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