“The Ministry for National Economy is drawing up a uniform action programme for the digitalisation of the Hungarian workforce, including several measures such as the learning of basic competencies, expanding user knowledge and reforming IT training”, the Minister of State for Labour Market and Vocational Education announced at a professional conference.

Péter Cseresznyés explained: “Amongst others, digitally illiterate citizens must be given the opportunity to acquire basic competencies free of charge and within a maximum of 30 kilometres from their homes, in addition to which basic digital abilities must be trained further to enable them to fill posts that require a high level of digital skills”.

“As part of the Digital Workforce Programme, the Government is planning to amongst others restructure the current system of adult education to provide rapid and efficient relief to digital professions that are suffering most from labour shortages, for instance by making available short-term training courses”, he continued.

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“In addition, the Ministry will be reviewing the training materials used and professional exam requirements applied within the vocational training and adult education systems to see if they include the required digital competencies. The Ministry responsible is also looking into opportunities for rewarding university students who are attending IT courses with higher state grants at a certain level of academic achievement”, Mr. Cseresznyés explained.

In his speech, EU Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport Tibor Navracsics said that while there exists a unified market within the European Union, a certain level of national or regional fragmentation may be observed within important subsectors, as a result of which the EU has been unable to switch to a digital economy at a suitably rapid rate.

“The EU has developed two strategies to solve the situation: the Digital Single Market strategy includes the harmonisation and modernisation of consumer protection regulations, online trading and copyrights, while the New Skills Agenda for Europe supports the setting out of basic competences that suit the requirements of the new age and determine future education and labour policy”, he explained.

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At the roundtable discussion held at the Digital Labour Market 2017 Conference, President of the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry László Parragh said that in his opinion digital knowledge and training must be introduced at every level of education. Mr. Parragh, however, also pointed out the challenge relating to the fact that according to estimates 40 percent of professions will transform completely within ten years, which makes it uncertain whether any of the skills currently studied in secondary schools will be of any use at all.

Chairman of the ICT Association of Hungary Tamás Laufer evaluated the results of the Digital Topic Week, aimed at spreading and promoting the methodology of digital teaching, as a positive development. 1000 schools and 8000 teachers joined the initiative, which was held for the second time this year, and if 40 percent of schools, teachers and students are successfully involved in the initiative within two years it will mean the commencement of irreversible positive changes, he told the press, stressing that this was how grassroots initiatives will grow to meet the methodology and regulatory environment arriving from above.

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Prime Ministerial Commissioner for the Digital Success Programme Tamás Deutsch drew attention to the weight of the digital economy within the national economy: “In Hungary the digital economy, in which 15 percent of workers are employed, contributes over 20 percent of GDP”.

According to Mr. Deutsch, a successful digital transformation could provide further impetus to the country’s economic development.

(Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister/MTI)