The State budget will play a pivotal role in the country's human resource development strategy in the next 10 years, according to the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI).

Based on demand for human resource development and professional training for the 2011-20 period, the MPI estimates a need of 2,135 trillion VND (101.6 billion USD) in investment for the plan, 12 percent of the total social investment.

The number of trained employees has been increasing rapidly and becoming more diverse, with the country's human capital potential ranked among the top in the world.

The national labour force pool will peak as the number of dependants (persons older than working age and children under 15) is a minority (less than 45 percent of the population). Of Vietnam 's population of around 87 million, more than half is in the labour force.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) said Vietnam has entered a "golden age" in its demographics, which usually lasts for around 30 years.

The labour force structure is shaped like a pyramid, with 58 percent of the labourers having basic professional skills; 28 percent with a high school education; 13 percent, undergraduates at university; and the rest, graduates of universities and colleges.

A minority of human resources has skills in advanced technology, and a number of new professions have been added as part of economic, scientific and technological development.

There is, however, a lack of high-quality human resources in science and high technology, according to a 2011-20 labour force-planning project approved by the Prime Minister in April.

The ministry said that there was also a shortage of skilled workers in fields key to the country's economic modernisation and competitiveness in the international community.

There are few Vietnamese participating in international organisations and institutions, according to the MPI report.

The shortage of skilled workers in key economic sectors is a major concern, the ministry said.

Another disadvantage is that trained workers are more skilled at theory than practice, and their ability to adapt to the competitive working environment is very poor.

The main reason for this shortcoming is the lack of a national-level master plan for labour force development.

The government, in an effort to address the problem, has asked the ministries, sectors and local administration's to plan their human resource development in harmony with the national strategy.

Business corporations and organisations have also been requested to create their own plan to develop human resources.

The national strategy targets to rapidly increase the trained labour force for all economic sectors, which is expected to see 30.5 million trained workers by 2015, with 55 percent of 55 million people working in all economic sectors.

The number will be nearly 44 million, amounting to 70 percent of 63 million, by 2020.

Under the plan, the labour force to be trained in vocational schools will be 23.5 million in five years and 34.4 million in 10 years.

Around seven million workers are expected to go through academic education by 2015 and 9.4 million by 2020.

The strategy has also set out a target of increasing the trained labour force in all economic sectors, from 40 percent in 2010 to 70 percent in 10 years.

Measures to help make the plan successful include increasing investment in human resource system development and creating a plan to allocate part of the State budget to prioritised tasks, projects and programmes on labour force development.

The mobilisation of finance from different sources for human resource development will be improved, according to the strategy.

The Government will also have policies to encourage people to invest in human resource development in different forms, including the building of training centres, capital contribution, the purchase of State bonds and the creation of community education promotion funds.

Policies will also be created to promote and encourage companies in all economic sectors to invest in the development of their own vocational training systems.

Attracting foreign investment will also be promoted, and the use of international organisations and individuals, especially Official Development Assistance, will be effectively used in developing human resources./.