08 Oct 2026
The second meeting of the URBACT Local Group under the Network4Work project took place today at the Prof. Petar Zhekov Cultural Centre for Gifted Children in Stara Zagora. Participants identified and prioritised the main challenges facing the local labour market. Through practical exercises and active discussions, they explored the problems, possible solutions and ways for different stakeholders to work together to address them.
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Radostin Tanev, Deputy Mayor of Stara Zagora, took an active part in the meeting. He emphasised that labour market development forms part of the broader plan to develop Stara Zagora as an industrial centre. He noted that the municipality, together with the European Commission, had developed a Regional Development Strategy outlining the region’s main challenges and future development priorities.
“The size of the city, our infrastructure and the data we have on workforce skills and education show that we need to attract investors who create added value—companies that employ university graduates and offer better-paid jobs,” Deputy Mayor Radostin Tanev emphasised.
He also highlighted the need to align education and business with labour market needs so that the city can prepare the workforce required by new investors. Cooperation with educational institutions aims to give young people more opportunities to acquire the necessary skills and subsequently pursue careers in Stara Zagora rather than seek opportunities elsewhere.
Attracting workers from other parts of Bulgaria is another element of the municipality’s labour market development efforts. The municipality has developed a Talent Attraction Strategy with several stages of action. Its initial priorities include encouraging Stara Zagora residents studying in other cities to return and pursue careers locally, alongside attracting people from other Bulgarian regions to choose the city as a place to work and live.
Salary levels, the cost of living and quality of life are among the factors influencing this decision. The strategy considers cities such as Pernik, Blagoevgrad, Ruse, Vidin, Sliven, Yambol, Haskovo and Veliko Tarnovo.
Deputy Mayor Tanev also addressed the rapid changes in the labour market, noting that people will increasingly change careers and need to acquire new skills. As an example of practical action in this area, he highlighted the successful editions of the WorkIn Stara Zagora career forum, which has established itself as a platform connecting employers with people seeking career opportunities in the city.
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Veronika Petkova, Chief Expert in the Department of Investments, Energy Efficiency and Green Transition, introduced participants to the experience of the project’s Lead Partner, Nyíregyháza in Hungary, and its successful Employment Forum model. This good practice addresses challenges including skills mismatches, unemployment and talent retention. Nyíregyháza’s experience demonstrates the importance of bringing stakeholders together around shared goals and maintaining consistent cooperation to find solutions to labour market challenges.
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This cooperation will continue in the project’s next stages. Following the identification of stakeholders, European good practices will be adapted to local conditions. The main challenges will be organised into thematic areas and examined through focus groups, where stakeholder representatives can discuss specific solutions and opportunities for joint action.
Petra Grgasović, Lead Expert for Network4Work, joined the meeting online to present international experience from the URBACT network and the good practice developed by the project’s Lead Partner, Nyíregyháza.
She outlined the city’s economic and social challenges, including GDP below 50% of the European Union average, an average net salary of EUR 610 compared with a national average of EUR 858, long-term structural unemployment and shortages of skilled workers. Despite the labour market’s broad reach, a substantial proportion of the potential workforce belongs to vulnerable groups, while the local economy consists predominantly of microenterprises.
In response to these challenges, Nyíregyháza has developed an Employment Forum with 38 members, bringing stakeholders together and encouraging joint action on labour market issues. More than 120 events involving over 5,000 participants have been organised through the initiative.
Petra Grgasović also presented the approach to developing a local employment strategy. This includes assessing employers’ needs, interviewing representatives of businesses and educational institutions, analysing labour market trends and examining why young talent leaves the city. These findings inform specific measures to address skills mismatches, retain young people and improve stakeholder cooperation.
She emphasised that one of the model’s key success factors is the active involvement of all stakeholders from the outset. Before establishing the Employment Forum, Nyíregyháza assessed the needs and interests of different institutions and organisations to identify shared themes and areas for cooperation.
Stara Zagora will develop its approach on this foundation. Nyíregyháza’s experience will serve as a starting point, adapted to the specific challenges, needs and characteristics of the local labour market.
During the practical session, participants worked interactively on specific labour market challenges in Stara Zagora. The workshop, entitled “Identifying and Prioritising Local Labour Market Challenges”, was led by Rositsa Raykova, Head of the Department of Investments, Energy Efficiency and Green Transition.
In a mapping exercise, participants identified what they considered the most significant obstacles facing the local labour market. Each participant wrote down specific problems and placed them on a shared board, bringing together the perspectives and practical observations of businesses, institutions, education providers and other stakeholders.
The contributions were then reviewed collectively and grouped into common themes. This enabled participants both to identify the problems and to organise them into areas for the Local Group to address during the project’s next stages.
Two challenges stood out: the mismatch between labour supply and demand, and the retention of young people.
Participants explored the underlying causes and discussed specific areas for action. These included the need to raise awareness and change attitudes, reluctance to retrain and acquire new skills, and the need for businesses to reconsider their own approaches and set more realistic expectations.
The discussion also considered the role of well-known public figures in reaching young people, raising awareness and sharing information about education, employment and career opportunities.
On retaining young people, participants highlighted the need for joint efforts by national and local government, including measures relating to workforce mobility. Expanding summer internship opportunities for university students was identified as a practical way to establish earlier connections between young people and local businesses.
Network4Work concludes in 2028, but the aim is for the partnerships and stakeholder cooperation established through the project to continue beyond its lifetime, supporting sustained improvements in employment in Stara Zagora.
The Municipality of Stara Zagora is a partner in the international Network4Work network, funded under the URBACT IV programme. The project brings together seven European cities and organisations working to improve local employment policies and develop sustainable solutions to labour market challenges.
The Hungarian city of Nyíregyháza is the project’s Lead Partner. The other partners are Lousada (Portugal), Pavlos Melas (Greece), SERDA (Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina), Stara Zagora (Bulgaria), Varberg (Sweden), and Vilanova i la Geltrú (Spain). The network’s main objective is to support partner cities in analysing local employment challenges and establishing effective mechanisms for cooperation between all stakeholders.
