Skills for the EU tourism workforce

An integral part of the resilience of EU tourism is making sure that people have the right skills for the job they are doing – in all sectors of the tourism ecosystem. Green and digital skills are essential, but softer skills, such as language knowledge, are necessary too. Increased training opportunities contribute to making jobs in the sector more attractive.

The EU Pact for Skills is the first flagship initiative under the European skills agenda. It aims to aid the resilience and recovery of all industrial ecosystems working towards their green and digital transitions. 

In the framework of the EU Pact for Skills, each of the 14 industrial ecosystems aims to set up sectorial large-scale skills partnerships from among pact signatories and other ecosystem actors interested in reskilling and upskilling their workforce.

The large-scale skills partnership for the tourism ecosystem launched in January 2022 with over 60 members, including industry, social partners, education and training providers and regional authorities.

The partnership identified several key performance indicators in its commitment to, not only increase training opportunities for the workforce but also improve the attractiveness of the sector, which is marked by a severe labour shortage following the COVID-19 pandemic.

National and regional skills partnerships are being set up to tackle these challenges at the local level. Membership in the large-scale skills partnership remains open. Potential members may grow-g1ec [dot] europa [dot] eu (send an email to express interest in joining) the partnership.

Several outputs identified in the co-created transition pathway for tourism relate to skills and educational development in general, and specifically to the Pact for Skills. These outputs incorporate several key performance indicators as set out in the large-scale skills partnership for tourism.

The co-implementation process will offer a collaborative platform for all tourism actors to implement and monitor the skills-related commitments together.

In 2023, a group of 5 Commission Junior Professionals chose to work on a project launched by DG GROW to address staff and skills shortages in the tourism ecosystem. This research was carried out in light of the current challenges facing tourism and especially hospitality SMEs.

For 1 year, these colleagues worked on identifying the causes of these shortages. They carried out a targeted survey of EU tourism stakeholders and conducted several interviews with key players as part of their research.

The Junior Professionals then compiled best practices in several EU countries to  help address such obstacles, and proposed several innovative ideas to tackle these challenges.

We invite all tourism stakeholders to read the report and get inspired by the best practices and ideas shared! An executive summary of their findings is also available.

• Skills for jobs highlights the initiatives and support provided by the Commission to employers, employees and EU countries in vocational and education training and related matters
• Blueprint for sectoral cooperation on skills: tourism 
• The Next Tourism Generation (NTG) Alliance