Skill development: Govt striving to make youth more employable

Labour minister stresses need to invest in training programmes

LAHORE: Provincial Minister for Labour and Human Resource Raja Ashfaq Sarwar on Wednesday stated that the government is striving hard to impart skills training to the youth in view of foreign and local requirement under the ‘Punjab Skills Development Strategy 2018’.

Presiding over a meeting of the skill development committee, at the P&D auditorium, he said that there was a great need and scope to invest in skill programmes supported by the public sector.

Sarwar stressed upon quality training in the technical education & vocational training authority (TEVTA) system, adding that the private sector could be seen as a supporting engine for improving quality of skills training.

He added that a target of training two million youth till 2018 will be successfully achieved through various programmes.

“Capacity building, quality assurance and good governance system have been introduced in all technical training institutes ensuring job placement for skill graduates along with enhancing opportunities for labour export to foreign countries,” Sarwar added.

He said that the Punjab Vocational Training Council, Punjab Skills Development Fund and TEVTA had taken extensive steps to enhance their capacity and were on track to meet their goals for the next six months training programme.

Earlier, the meeting was informed that the TEVTA had taken special initiatives by introducing Chinese language courses offered from native teachers of Qingdao Hengzing University for 12,300 students per year.

Interest-free loans of Rs287.866 million out of Rs500 million had already been disbursed to 5,367 skill graduates through Akhuwat while 1,600 jail prisoners had been imparted skills through 30 training centres in three month courses.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 3^rd, 2016.

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