Economische en Sociale Comités van EU en China: focus op kinderrechten, sociale dialoog en integratie (en)
Representatives from the European Economic and Social Committee and their counterparts from the Chinese Economic and Social Council will concentrate on children's rights, social dialogue and integration policy at their meeting at 14 -15 December.
Their main focus will be Children's Rights and, in particular, the question of child trafficking - one of whose main routes passes through China - and poverty, since children are those hit hardest by the economic crisis.
Jillian van Turnhout, EESC Member, Chief Executive of the Irish Children's Rights Alliance and former President of the National Youth Council of Ireland and Lu Shizheng, Vice-Chair of the Chinese association for research on youth and children, speaking for Europe and China respectively, will present the conclusions and the main lines to be pursued in cooperation and the exchange of good practices on children's rights in 2011, which has been declared the EU-China Youth Year.
Social dialogue will be another main topic at the Round Table meeting. Following on from the discussions launched in 2009, members of the Round Table recognized how important this topic was in the context of China today. Various models will be presented and discussed. A general typology will be presented by the Director of the ILO, the Belgian model will be set out by representatives of the social partners, along with models from other countries including China and Germany.
Finally, an information session on the Union's integration policy will be organised in conjunction with the European Commission's DG Regio.
The two Co-Chairs, Staffan Nilsson, President of the EESC, and Xin Yuenmin, President of the Tianjin Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, will present the conclusions of these two days of discussions.
EESC President Staffan Nilsson and his Chinese counterpart Xing Yuenmin, rapporteurs Peter Clever (Employers' Group, Germany; on the review of the work of the round table) and Jillian van Turnhout (Various Interests' Group, Ireland; on children poverty), Jonathan Peel (Employers' Group, UK), Zhu Yinghuang (former editor of China Daily) and Lu Shizheng from the Chinese delegation will be available for comment at 11.30 a.m., Wednesday 15 December.
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