Czech Presidency holds international conference on education and training in European armaments cooperation

On 15 and 16 June 2009 the Czech EU Presidency held an international conference on European Education and Training in Armaments Co-operation – The Way Ahead.

The conference, which took place at the Prague Congress Centre, hosted over 70 delegates from 20 EU Member States, Norway, Switzerland and the USA. Its aim was to enhance the existing activities of the European Defence Agency (EDA) in the field of education and training in European armaments cooperation. The agenda and organisation of the conference were prepared by the Armaments Division of the Czech Ministry of Defence in cooperation with the EDA. The conference brought together representatives of the EU Defence Ministries, the European Commission, the EU Council, the EDA, the EU Institute for Security Studies, NATO, OCCAR (Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation), national armament agencies, scientific institutions and, last but not least, representatives of the European defence industry. In the course of two discussion panels and in the final conclusions, the participants agreed on the need to work together in education and training in the field of armaments within the EU and to set up a European armaments educational and training platform.

Education and training in armaments is one of the themes that are currently receiving a lot of attention from the EDA and its member states. However, the EDA’s almost five-year-long experience has shown that in order to further increase the efficiency of international cooperation we need to enhance the expert qualifications of workers in the field of international cooperation in armaments at national level. The areas concerned include above all expert knowledge of project management and relevant knowledge of the political, economic, financial and procedural framework necessary for the implementation of joint armaments programmes. A lack of qualification of workers concerned may compromise the efficiency of joint programmes and consequently jeopardise their successful completion. Today, the training of project managers is usually conducted at national level with no links to the European level and in some cases also out of touch with the military environment, if the project managers in question are trained in civil educational institutions. This state of play clearly shows the need to find a common solution. For smaller countries in particular, specialised education aimed at a restricted number of managers of joint programmes is becoming very costly and, given the current lack of specialised courses and modules in the field of armaments, also difficult to implement.

Supporting the establishment of a common European educational and training platform in armaments is also one of the priorities of the Czech Presidency in the field of the European security and defence policy (ESDP).

Director of the Armaments Management Department of the Czech Ministry of Defence and Deputy of the National Armaments Director Pavel Černý believes that this conference could become a sort of catalyst for new approaches towards cooperation in armaments at European level. “In spite of certain differences in the national armaments systems, we have, alongside our European colleagues, endorsed the work done so far by EDA on the common educational and training platform by presenting a number of innovative proposals and approaches”, he said. The conference outputs and recommendation will be submitted to the autumn meeting of the Steering Board of the EDA at the level of EU Defence Ministers.