In Lebanon, the ILO’s focus in the PROSPECTS Partnership is on enhancing resilience of Lebanon’s crisis-hit labour market and creating better livelihoods for both Lebanese host communities and Syrian refugees. It will do so by promoting the development of market-relevant skills, enhancing employment placement services and labour market governance, strengthening social protection schemes, and promoting micro, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs) and sectors with potential for decent job creation. Amongst other tools and approaches, the ILO will use its Approach to Inclusive Market Systems (AIMS) to unlock opportunities for decent job creation in the horticulture sector. AIMS was developed in 2013 in close collaboration with the UNHCR to make livelihood interventions for host communities and forcibly displaced persons more sustainable and holistic. In doing so, AIMS applies the market system development approach (also called Making Markets Work for the Poor, or M4P) to the context of forced displacement.

This Market Systems Analysis entitled “Unlocking opportunities for decent job creation in Lebanon’s horticulture sector” was conducted by the Springfield Centre, and forms the basis for the ILO’s intervention strategy to create and retain decent jobs for host communities and forcibly displaced persons in the sector. The AIMS strategy in Lebanon, which was developed on the basis of this analysis, foresees targeted interventions to increase economic opportunities and benefits for Lebanese farming households whilst also improving job prospects, working conditions and incomes for refugees in Lebanon’s horticulture sector.