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Research background: In the context of globalization, education processes are of great importance for the development of urban communities. Identifying the needs of the labour market should be the goal of any organization that provides education and training. Purpose of the article: Globalization leads to the emergence of new specializations and qualifications. In order to facilitate the acquisition of competencies and abilities specific to new qualifications and specializations, it is necessary to involve education and training providers. Methods: The article analyses the evolution of the employment rate, respectively of the unemployment rate. Urban communities need to respond to new societal, economic and environmental challenges. Findings & Value added: One of the major problems of urban communities is the risk of poverty and social exclusion. Thus, for the Member States of the European Union, the article presents the comparative situation of people at risk of poverty and social exclusion. For the Member States of the European Union, the evolution of the participation rate in education and training programs is followed in this article. The article also presents an analysis of the level of education of the urban population. Due to urban concentrations, the launch of new products and services is much easier.

The present research is an exploratory study aiming at presenting the measures taken by the European Union to support the creation and development of clusters and to analyze Romania’s position in relation to other Member States in terms of key factors impacting cluster development. Impact factors on the development of clusters, such as digital skills among the active population, the degree of development of innovative companies, the number of applications for obtaining patents per one million inhabitants, the degree of development of clusters and the share of GDP in expenditures for research, development and innovation (%) were considered. The study highlights that Romania ranks last in the European ranking, due to the lack of incentives to promote the emergence of strong innovative clusters, underfunding of the innovation system and the absence of a legislative framework to support small and medium enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]