Skill development needed to benefit from globalisation

MCCI president says wholehearted efforts should be made to enhance growth

MULTAN: Multan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) President Khawaja Jalaluddin Roomi has emphasised that Pakistanis should develop their skills in order to benefit from the process of globalisation.

Roomi, who was accompanied by Technology Upgradation and Skill Development Company (Tusdec) Chief Executive Officer Muhammad Alamgir Chaudhry, said skill development resulted in mastery, resiliency and core competency in various fields.

“With the advent of globalisation, economic growth crucially depends on skills for producing better quality goods and services at competitive prices,” he said.

“Skill building is not an isolated process though. It requires developments in three areas which include creative and cognitive skills, personal and social skills and vocational and job skills.”

Chaudhry said Tusdec was being successfully managed by a public-private partnership with two-thirds of its board members from the private sector and one-third from the public sector.

“Tusdec is entirely funded by the government with paid-up capital of Rs150 million divided into 15 million shares of Rs10 each,” he said.

Under the organisation, seven centres have been established so far in different parts of the country, with three centres functioning in light engineering, which would help in reverse engineering and computer-aided designing among other things.

Nonetheless, the MCCI president said skill development needed more focus, especially in critical areas. “Formal institutions produce a very small proportion for the skilled workforce and not necessarily in accordance with the demand for the required quality,” he said, adding employer-based bodies in each province needed urgent assessment.

Currently, technical education is being imparted through 546 technical and vocational institutions with capacity of a little over 200,000.

On the occasion, another member of MCCI said Pakistan had neither been able to improve vocational and job skills nor had been able to inculcate the creative and cognitive skills and personal and social skills, resulting in loss of output, exports and employment, coupled with slow growth and low living standards.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1^st, 2017.

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