The announcement was made by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who revealed the goal of having “at least 78 percent of the employed adult population” by 2030 in the EU.

Participating in a virtual conference on Employment promoted by the European People's Party, the official stressed that the proposal contains "ambitious objectives in terms of jobs and skills", which are also "clear and measurable goals".

As far as the employability rate is concerned, there is then an increase in relation to the previous goal of having 75 percent of the adult population in the EU working.

“And this (the target of 78 percent) is possible if we increase the participation of women in the workforce and, for that, we need good schools and good childcare, which is also crucial for the next generation”, said Ursula von der Leyen.

Together with the Social Pillar action plan, the community executive will also present on Thursday a recommendation on active and effective support for employment given the crisis generated by the covid-19.

According to data from the Community statistical office, Eurostat, until 2019 there was a “persistent increase in the employment rate at EU level”.

In particular, in that year before the pandemic, “the employment rate of people aged 20 to 64 in the EU-27 reached 73.1 percent”, which was the “highest rate recorded since 2008”, the year that served benchmark for the Europe 2020 strategy because it was before the last financial crisis.

In 2019, the EU-27 was thus 1.9 percentage points per year from its 75 percent employment target.

In Portugal, still according to Eurostat, this goal was exceeded in 2019 with an employment rate of 76.1 percent (the seventh highest in the EU), which compares with a percentage of 73.1 percent in 2008.