FOI officials on training visits to Ireland under a Euro-Med twinning agreement

Thanks to arrangements available to the FOI under a Euro Med project financed out of EU funds, the FOI concluded a twinning agreement with the Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC).

As a result, an IBEC official specialising in industrial relations held meetings with FOI officials during a visit to Malta, while three FOI representatives visited Ireland on training visits.

Leonard Mizzi, director of the FOI's Representative Office in Brussels, the Malta Business Bureau, visited Dublin on September 19-20. The scope of this particular visit was to comprehend how national competitiveness is measured in Ireland and how the social partners, especially IBEC, are involved in the formulation of a national competitiveness strategy.

In fact, the issue of competitiveness dominates the Irish political and socio-economic agenda. The meetings set for Dr Mizzi by IBEC included visits to the National Economic and Social Council (the Irish MCESD), the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, the Prime Minister's office, FORFAS - the national policy and advisory board for enterprise, trade, science, technology and innovation, and the Irish Food Board.

During the visit, Dr Mizzi also attended an IBEC conference entitled "Our future in Europe - Nice and Beyond".

FOI Council member and chairman of the FOI Environment Committee Godwin C. Micallef also visited Dublin a week ago. Mr Micallef's visit focused on issues related to the environment.

He had the opportunity to hold extensive meetings with the director and officials of the IBEC Environment Unit and was able to have a close look and exchange views on IBEC's activities/lobbying techniques on environment issues; and to find out about IBEC's relations with the Environment Protection Agency, NGOs and other third parties having environmental issues high on their agenda.

Mr Micallef discussed specific issues, including waste management, environment services and energy. He also accompanied IBEC officials during meetings of the IBEC Waste Contractors and Environment Policy Committee and attended sessions of some courses IBEC is currently running.

The FOI official also had an interesting visit to RePak, a non-profit making private company established under a voluntary agreement between industry and the Department of the Environment and Local Government as industry's response to the obligations placed on Ireland by the EU Directive on Packaging and Packaging Waste.

FOI executive Cecilia M. Vella also visited IBEC. This had an organisational focus on the IBEC structure, especially representation of business views at all levels, the services it gives to industry and employers in general, and its media presence.

Throughout her intensive visit, Ms Vella had 25 meetings with key executives and heads of various units within various IBEC divisions. During her visit, Ms Vella attended two divisional meetings, namely the Enterprise Divisional Meeting headed by director Brendan Butler and a Strategy and EU Affairs Divisional Meeting, headed by director Maria Cronin.

Ms Vella also met with some of the sector associations, federations and affiliated associations within IBEC, namely the Building Materials Federation (BMF), the Information and Communications Technology Ireland (ICT Ireland), the Plastics Industry Federation (PIA), the Irish Association of Pigmeat Processors, the Irish ProShare Association, as well as the Small Firms Association (SFA).

The FOI received a visit last week from IBEC official Katie Connolly, who specialises in providing services to members on industrial relations. During her visit, Ms Connolly met FOI director general Edwin Calleja, FOI administration manager John B. Scicluna and FOI Human Resources and Social Policy Working Group member Joe Montebello.