Pilot of the APEC occupational standards in hospitality in Latin America
Authors:
Melinda Brown
SkillsIQ
Theme: Qualifications
Presentation:
As tourism and hospitality continue to recover from the global COVID-19 pandemic, it has never been more important to address these sectors’ ongoing workforce shortages and skill gaps through innovative and collaborative workforce training strategies.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Occupational Standards is a framework that outlines common benchmarks and standards of job roles across APEC economies, with the long-term aim of facilitating labour mobility of skilled workers within and across member countries.
Funded by the Australian Department of Education, this co-led Australian pilot project undertaken in collaboration with the Pacific Alliance countries of Peru, Chile, Mexico and Colombia (Pacific Alliance partners), aimed to determine the feasibility of implementing the APEC Tourism Occupational Standards in domestic training for key job roles in the hospitality sector. Establishing a common training reference was also of focus to encourage international skills collaboration between institutions.
The project enacted a comprehensive program of collaborative activities, bringing Government, industry and the training sectors together from across the four economies to map, validate and evaluate occupational standards for the key job roles in hospitality of Cook and Housekeeper. Through face-to-face and online workshops, the project provided a platform for industry to voice their skills needs and their workforce challenges as well as for training providers to discuss national training and curriculum in relation to international standards and how they would meet the future skill needs of industry.
Some of the project’s key outcomes involved strengthening the connection between training and the workplace, and in particular building relations with industry to address skill gaps. Looking to the future, it has showcased the international certification of skills competencies and qualifications as a long-term goal ripe for exploration.
The highly successful pilot project was conducted from 2019 to 2023, with a final report submitted in February 2024. SkillsIQ, the project consultant, is excited to present the methodology and outcomes, as well as the lessons learned from the project regarding VET partnerships and skilling workers to an Australian audience.