The European Union's recent LABOURatory project on "Regular Forecasting of Training Needs" was intended to explore labour-market information systems and methods in four EU Member States (France, Germany, Ireland and the Netherlands) and to compare them with data availability and applicable methods in three candidate countries (Czech Republic, Poland and Slovenia). The ultimate goal of the project, which was carried out under the Leonardo da Vinci programme, was the elaboration of a methodology for forecasting training needs that would be applicable in the context of labour markets in transition economies, as well as the improvement of existing prognostic approaches in EU Member States.