Project

The project started in the beginning of May 2017 as a result of the commitment that the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy has taken under the Joint Declaration of the SEECP participants. The Joint Declaration was signed during the International Ministerial Conference in Sofia, held on 12-13th May 2016. The Conference laid the basis of a future common long-term work on establishing operating mechanisms at regional level for management of the demographic processes through undertaking common initiatives and projects, based on exchange of experience and good practices.

The Republic of Bulgaria set the demographic issues among the priorities of its programme in the framework of the chairmanship-in-office of the SEECP (July 2015 – June 2016) and makes efforts to synchronize the actions to face the demographic challenges.

The priority directions and tasks in the field of demographic policy of the Republic of Bulgaria are formulated in the Updated National Strategy for Demographic Development of the Population in the Republic of Bulgaria 2012-2030 and are aimed at realizing the following objective - slowing the rate of decrease of the population with an intend to stabilize it in the long run and to ensure a high quality of human life, including health, education, qualifications, abilities and skills. An integrated approach is applied to maximize coverage of the demographic problems. The main objective of the plan in the field of demographic policy is to limit the negative effects of demographic imbalances applied on the public finances and social systems. The Ministry of Labor and Social Policy (MLSP) manages, coordinates and controls the implementation of the state policy in the field of demographic development, as well as the activity of analyzing, evaluating and forecasting demographic processes in cooperation with other state structures, social partners and non-governmental organizations.

The project aim is to support a closer cooperation among the SEECP participants to face the demographic changes. More concretely, cooperation will be supported in areas, such as: undertaking measures on the labour market; increasing labour mobility; promoting youth employment, as well as the active and productive life of older people; increasing the quality of human capital; facilitating the territorial and trans-border cooperation to establish and maintain regions for sustainable development and inclusive growth, etc.