Short answer. The Council sets national skills standards for industry trades under Article 48, in consultation with employers' and workers' organizations and appropriate government authorities. The Council then administers those standards once established, rather than leaving that role to any other body.
What the law says
There shall be national skills standards for industry trades to be established by the Council in consultation with employers’ and workers’ organizations and appropriate government authorities.
Labor Code, Article 48 — National Skills Standards. Read the full provision →
What the law says
The Council shall thereafter administer the national skills standards.
Labor Code, Article 48 — National Skills Standards. Read the full provision →
The Council is the body responsible for setting the standards
Article 48 answers the question of who sets national skills standards directly: "there shall be national skills standards for industry trades to be established by the Council." Responsibility for creating these standards is placed with the Council specifically, rather than being scattered across multiple agencies or left to individual industries to define for themselves. This centralizes the standard-setting function in a single body contemplated by this part of the Labor Code.
The consultation requirement built into the process
The Council does not set these standards in isolation. The article requires that they be established "in consultation with employers' and workers' organizations and appropriate government authorities." This means the process is meant to draw on the perspective of both sides of the employment relationship — the employers who need workers meeting certain skill levels and the workers' organizations representing those who will be trained and measured against the standards — along with relevant government bodies.
Why involving both employers and workers matters
Skills standards that employers find unrealistic or that fail to reflect what industries actually need would undermine the purpose of having national standards at all, while standards developed without worker input risk ignoring the practical realities and interests of the people expected to be trained and evaluated under them. Requiring consultation with both groups, together with appropriate government authorities, is meant to produce standards that are workable from both the employer and worker perspective rather than imposed unilaterally.
The Council's role continues after the standards are set
Article 48 does not stop at the establishment of the standards. It further provides that "the Council shall thereafter administer the national skills standards." This gives the Council ongoing responsibility, not just a one-time task of drafting and issuing the standards, and it also means the Labor Code's numbering has since been administratively revised, so this same provision on standard-setting and administration may appear under a different article number in more recent references, even though the underlying rule assigning both functions to the Council remains exactly the same regardless of which number is used to cite it.