On May 10^th, 2010, the re-election of Sonja Zwazl to the post of President of the Chamber of Commerce for the Austrian region of Niederösterreich was confirmed. This gave the president of the chamber the opportunity to outline the things which, according to her, will be the thematic priorities of the WK-NÖ for the next five years.

The most fundamental of these were strengthening member services, particularly on a regional basis and trying to understand, harness, as well as support existing trends. However, another priority was then added to this list: “Bildung forcieren-Arbeitsmarkt gestalten”, which, in English, roughly translates into “hasten training and develop the labour market”.

This final priority may seem out of place compared to the others, but in truth, it is a sine qua non condition of their development: the availability of training, the acquisition of expertise in any place or area is a positive externality that boosts the business climate of a region. Furthermore, the lack of training makes it less possible to find workers who are both willing and qualified to follow the aforementioned trends.

Training is a word that may mean a lot of things; should one assume that it includes certifying social and personal competency, which is the mission of the ECo-C? To this question, the answer is an unequivocal yes:  Mrs. Zwazl herself visited the offices of IPKeurope on May 13^th to personally inform herself on the nature of the ECo-C and the quality of the certificate’s content. That this visit came so soon after her re-election, delivers a strong message of support to the ECo-C initiative, underlining its usefulness to businesses and professionals alike.

Pictured: Sonja Zwazl and Leopold Kaiblinger at IPKeurope on 13.05.2010