Despite real increases in the scope of, and expenditure on, active labour market policies (ALMPs) in Croatia, they remain insufficiently targeted, in particular as regards outreach to older and low-skilled persons. Participation in ALMP measures and the level of ALMP expenditure have increased in recent years but remain quite low. The Croatian Employment Service outsourced the firm Ipsos Puls to conduct an external evaluation of ALMP measures in 2010-13, with a view to improving the effectiveness and quality of services and the measures themselves.
As part of the project, a final conference was held and the results have been published in the publication External Evaluation of Active Labour-Market Policy Measures 2010-2013. Based on evaluation results, general recommendations and conclusions were provided that active employment policy measures were good, but they should be constantly revised. The emphasis was made to provide for financial sustainability of measures in order to avoid discontinuing programs. The measures should be consolidated and those with poor interest should be cancelled.