Committee chair Andreja Potočnik noted that while Slovenia was recording excellent economic trends, there were challenges related to staff.

According to Potočnik, employment is on the rise, which is an indicator showing that young people are not emigrating, but there is the challenge of providing adequate staff for the needs of the Slovenian economy.

"But we also have solutions. We need a better connection between the economy and the education system and more flexibility of re-qualifications for adequate working skills and skills which the economy needs," she added.

The session was attended by Economy Minister Zdravko Počivalšek, who said that the problem of competence of young people was solvable, as Slovenia was recording economic growth, the number of the unemployed is dropping and new jobs were being opened.

"Therefore, we can offer work to young people. We only need to divert the education flow from the direction of the public sector to the direction of technical skills".

The problem of how to ensure adequate staff for companies is a topic which needs to be dealt with from various aspects, at several departments, and must include various groups, such as students, job seekers of all ages and employees, he added.

According to Počivalšek, special attention should also be paid to vulnerable target groups, as well as the most prospective ones, who can be a driving force of economic growth.

Staff is one of the key factors of competitiveness, which is why effective mechanisms of cooperation between institutions need to be encouraged, and development and implementation of adequate programmes need to be promoted, both in the form of state co-funding and tax breaks, he added.

The same topic was discussed as the Krško unit of the Chamber of Trade Crafts and Small Business (OZS) and MEP Franc Bogovič (SLS/EPP) presented at a round table debate the Alliance for Youth, a project aimed at eliminating unemployment among young people in Europe.

Bogovič said that despite the financial and economic crisis, the unemployment rate among young people in Germany, Austria and Switzerland had never dropped below 10%, which he attributed to a dual system of vocational education.

With a 15% unemployment rate among young people, Slovenia is currently an average EU country, but it is still almost at the bottom in terms of them finding a job in the first three years after the conclusion of education, he added.

"More practical education needs to be introduced in schools in Slovenia, technical culture needs to be raised and the mindset that children should go to school so that they wouldn't have to work needs to be eradicated," the MEP said.

OZS president Branko Meh pointed to the warning from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on population ageing and stressed that Slovenia urgently needed to acquire young and technically-skilled staff.

Meh is disappointed with the fact that, since the law introducing apprenticeship into the Slovenian vocational eduction system was adopted a year ago, only 53 young people out of the planned 200 joined the scheme.

According to him, the market will dictate pay policy in the future, because an increased demand for good staff will result in an employer failing to get good staff if they are not willing to pay them well.