THE IMPORTANCE OF VOCATIONAL ORIENTATION IN SATISFYING THE DEMAND FOR AGRICULTURAL WORKERS

Name of institution   Chamber of agriculture of the Republic of Lithuania
 
Duration of the project   1/04/2015 - 31/09/2015
 
Contact person      Simona Svoilaite
 
Summary of the project   
 
The main aim of this project is to introduce agricultural sector professions, their perspectives and career planning opportunities to the rural youth. With this project, we seek not only to show that agricultural professions have great opportunities of international mobility, but also to increase the compliance of education facilities with the needs of the labour market. We are planning to reach these aims by creating a methodological tool – a video "Career planning in agriculture".
 
In this video we will review the situation in the agriculture sector and its perspectives in Lithuania. The biggest attention will be directed to vocational guidance, increasing the attractiveness of agricultural professions and raising motivation for youth to choose the professions necessary for the rural areas. We will present agricultural professions that currently have the greatest demand, their content, learning perspectives, skills that will be acquired and so on in order to motivate young people to choose a profession necessary for agriculture and the rural areas. The youth will be acquainted with the European Qualifications Framework (EKS) and its fundamental principles. By filming visits in farms which has the 'Green diploma' (Certificate, showing that the farm is qualified to take in students for work-practice) we will show and tell about real places for work practice in modern farms, where the students could adapt their theoretical knowledge in practice. Representatives of employers will provide information about the lack of agriculture workers and the necessary requirements.
 
Through this video young people will be acquainted with the demand and perspectives of agricultural professions, and oriented to plan their future professional career according to the needs of agricultural sector. They also will know about available places for work-practice and qualification improvement in modern farms and sectorial training centres, where skills that will be helpful in the labour market can be acquired. Youth self-confidence and faith in career possibilities in rural area will be raised, which will encourage them to choose professions in the agriculture sector and create businesses in the rural areas. Dissemination of information about mobility opportunities will increase rural youth mobility not just nationwide, but also worldwide.
 
The measure 'Career planning in agriculture' is dedicated for 8-12 class students and for adults seeking to retrain and to acquire agricultural professions that are in demand in the current labour market. It is expected that this measure will reach about 1700-2300 final users (during the project implementation period). In the future, this number will be eve larger because the project has enduring value at least for 4-5 years.