This week, Real Economy visited Spain’, the first country to receive billions of dollars from AB’'s pandemic recovery fund.
We talk to Nadia Calviño, Spain's Minister of Economy and Digitalization, and meet with students at Tenerife’, where rescue funds are spent on vocational training.
The foundations of the European ’ recovery are being laid
Europe’'s response to the pandemic crisis (at current prices) was a historic stimulus plan worth €806.9 billion.
At the heart of this is the €723.8 billion Improvement and Resilience Facility, which aims to help EU countries get back on their feet by investing, creating jobs and building a green and digital future (at current prices).
Spain will receive 69.5 billion Euro’ of this money; This is the largest public investment plan in the country's recent history. So far, it has received €9 billion in emergency pre-financing and received its first installment, €10 billion in ’ in December 2021.
Canaries like Tenerife’de Adrián learn professional skills to help them find work.
Adrián, “You can get a lot of theory in the university, but very little practice. The good thing about vocational training is that you have the option to do an internship, ” explains.
“If they like the way you work and need people, they'll take you. How do I see my future after this training? Well, I hope I start working on something about that. I would like to work in different countries of the world. The U.S., Germany, the U.K., everywhere, but I work in different places, ” adds.
Although training centres such as Adrián’'s already exist, partly thanks to the European Social Fund, the Recovery Fund’'s €2 billion will be allocated to the creation of 135,000 new vocational training centres in ’, Spain.
Jorge Rivero Antuña, director of the CIFP César Manrique vocational school, says the money is already being used to teach technology and business.
“We receive funding from the European ’, known as the European Social Fund. This includes teachers' salaries and training courses for the unemployed and workers. %Covers 80’ini. Regarding the resilience mechanism, we have already received the necessary money for technology lessons, entrepreneurship, etc. We hope that we will continue to receive funds throughout 2022 and 2023.”
Rise of technology
Tourism remains the main driver of economic activity in Tenerife’, but the archipelago's rapidly growing technology sector also provides business opportunities.
Carlos Rodríguez is the founder of Omnia Infosys’in, a company that helps SMEs and public institutions in the Canary Islands’ in their digital transformation needs. Despite high regional and national rates of youth unemployment, Carlos says the firm is struggling to find the right candidates.
“Currently, people in both the Canary Islands of ’nda and the rest of Spain’ do not have the right education to meet what we need. We don't have all the skills we need, but people don't have them, ” explains.
Despite this difficulty, Carlos concludes optimistically: “This sector will grow a lot. There will be a lot of demand. We need more and more people with different skills because the demand has been incredible since COVID-19’. Growth has tripled or quadrupled in the last two years. And that growth will continue to grow. In fact, there are millions of job openings in this sector in Europe’.
Transforming the Spanish economy
To receive its first payment of €10 billion, Spain had to implement dozens of structural reforms, including measures aimed at improving the vocational education ecosystem and reducing gender pay inequality in the workplace.
Other EU member states are also currently encouraging reforms to get their share of the bailout funds.
Real Economy, SpainTo learn more about ’'s national recovery plan and how it plans to use recovery funds to transform the country's economy, spoke with the country's Vice-President of Government and Minister of Economy and Digitalization, Nadia Calviño.
According to Euronews:“Spain’ya will be given almost 70 billion euros. What will this mean for Spain and the Spanish economy?”
Nadia Calviño, Vice-President of the Government of Spain and Minister of Economy and Digitalization:
“This is the present of ’ in Spain and SpainIt is very important for the future of ’ and for future generations. Our recovery plan focuses on four axes: green, digital, social and regional cohesion and gender equality that drive all our programs. Digital will represent about 30 percent of the total investment.’
According to Euronews:These funds come with a number of structural reforms. How hard was it to meet all these conditions?
Nadia Calvino:“The process was cumbersome and very busy. We were a little bit like guinea pigs, starting the process. Together with the Commission, we are learning how to implement this unprecedented recovery plan.
As for the reforms, we accelerated them throughout 2021, now the main challenge is to complete what is waiting in parliament and maintain the flow of funds that began last year.”
According to Euronews:“Are you sure you have the administrative capacity to do this?”
Nadia Calvino:“This is a very, very important challenge for every administration. Spain is a great country; It's a complicated country. We have a multi-level management. For this reason, we have created a management structure and strengthened the mechanisms we have.
In the coming weeks, we will launch some of the most important strategic plans, such as leading the transition to electric and connected vehicles.
According to Euronews:“How much difference do you think vocational education projects will make in terms of unemployment?”
Nadia Calvino:“Vocational education is one of the keys to unlocking a better functioning labor market in the future. Our unemployment rate has fallen to 13.3%’e, which provides us with a good foundation along with structural reforms, particularly labour market reform, and, at the same time, with a crucial investment effort towards education, vocational training and lifelong learning, Spain, which could allow ’ to finally overcome some of the imbalances that have driven growth and prosperity for decades.
