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CII organizes the International Conclave on skills development
By siliconindia
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Saturday, 15 December 2007, 02:46 IST
New Delhi: "India needs to impart relevant skill to 10 million people every year to reap the benefit of globalization," said Oscar Fernandes, Union Minister of state for Labour and Employment, at International Conclave on Skills Development, organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
"To achieve this objective, the government is opening new industrial training institutes (ITIs), vocational schools and skill development centers. Industry should come forward to be equal partner in the initiative," he added.
Minister highlighted the importance of skilled manpower in the socio-economic development of India, and called upon industry and NGOs to join hands with the government. "Skill development should be high on governance agenda and state governments should work closely with industry in this direction," said Fernandes.
He pointed that 12.8 million people join labour force every year. India has infrastructure to train only 2.5 million people and said there should be effective public-private partnership to bridge this gap.
"Our population is not a problem, but an asset. We should provide our workforce world-class training and skill to excel in the new world order. The objective of providing skill is to provide employment. At the same time, we need to train large number of people to train people," he added.
"There is a need to recognize skill needs in the context of changing scenario around the globe. Industry and institutions are more than willing to help the government in creating skill development programmes," said Vijay Thandani, Chairman, CII Education Committee and CEO, NIIT in his welcome remark.
India's Demographic Dividend is a well-known fact, wherein the labor force is growing much more rapidly than the overall population. But, we need to ensure that this demographic boon does not become a bane. This means that the pace of job creation or self-employment opportunities must increase at an exponential speed, said Purandeswari, Minister of State (Human Resource & Employment).
Fernandes felicitated participants of WorldSkills International 2007 and Purandeswari felicitated the participants of the International Abilympics held in Japan in November this year.