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The main aim of this paper is to identify current levels of knowledge, skills and abilities of the SMEs’ employees in North Macedonia, vis-à-vis firms’ needs for knowledge and skills. This paper analyzes the current levels of employee job-specific, soft, digital and entrepreneurial skills on a sample of firms in North Macedonia. For the purposes of this research, the employees were classified in three categories: core employees, supporting employees and managers. The results of the research show that the main challenge regarding the soft skills refers to solving complex problems, capacity for job analysis and initiative. Adapting to new technologies is found to be the weakest aspect of digital skill among employees. Entrepreneurial skills related to risk taking, capacity to generate new ideas, creativity and innovation as well as flexibility at work are also considered to be a challenge.

This chapter considers the trend of human development in the RNM, presented through the HDI. The special focus would be the links with the problem of poverty and inequality in the economy, regarding the data for the GINI, IHDI, GDI, poverty line, MPI, vulnerable employment, and youth unemployment. The research subject is the period from 2010 to 2017, using the secondary statistical data. Comparative analysis, with the countries from the CESEE countries, further improve the quality of the chapter. The RNM is a country with a high level of human development, and it is relatively equally distributed among the population. There is a difference in the distribution of the achievements of HD and an intermediate level of equality in the distribution between the genders. Income inequality expressed with the GINI index shows increase. The results confirm that there is no automatic link between the economic growth and human development. Income and gender inequality regress the quality of life in Macedonia. Growth in RNM in the past period has failed to produce the expected positive effects.

The main goal of this paper is to identify the challenges of the sustainable demographic development in terms of the changes and current demographic situation in the Western Balkan countries, as well as to detect the importance of comprehensive and consistent population policies. The analysis is based on the relevant indicators for demographic changes identified in the Sustainable Development Strategy of the EU. The comparative analysis is made for the following countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, Republic of Macedonia and Serbia. The available data from the Eurostat statistics and other relevant data sources for the last decade are used. Also, relevant studies considering the demographic development and adopted population policies are observed. The added value of this research is in the comparison of the demographic indicators and recognizing their importance for the sustainable demographic development of this region as one of the key preconditions for the future sustainable development. The results of the analysis show that the demographic changes are big challenge for the sustainable development in all Western Balkan countries. They have implications in many domains and should be in the focus not only of the demographers, but of the researchers and policy makers in different fields of the macroeconomics as well. The lack of data for old-age income adequacy and public finance sustainability imposes the need for comprehensive database in each country as a precondition for continuous monitoring of the demographic changes and for creating appropriate policies regarding the sustainable development. Based on the results of this research, the common areas where the population policies of these countries should be directed are identified.