ALTER COLUMN SET DATA TYPE support all compatible types on DB2 9.7
varchar(20) to varchar(10), integer to smallint, ...
Now it's possible to convert all compatible types, see the examples below:
TAB1
NAME VARCHAR(20)
COD INTEGER
db2 "alter table TAB1 alter column NAME set data type VARCHAR(15)"
db2 "alter table TAB1 alter column COD set data type SMALLINT"