Minister of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan has affirmed that the government encourages vocational training establishments to join with foreign advanced training schools and create favourable conditions for prestigious investors to open schools in Vietnam.

At an online Government conference on the issue held in Hanoi on August 6, Minister Ngan said that from now until 2020, efforts to enhance vocational training will focus on learning from the experience of foreign countries, while increasing the number of foreign diplomas and certificates recognised.

Announcing the scheme, which will be presented to the Government at next month’s regular cabinet meeting, the minister said that investment policy in vocational training will be geared toward hi-tech as its top priority and spearhead high-quality, specialised careers to serve the demand of each region’s market. Also, non-State schools will be provided with preferential credits, receive development funding and join in competitive bidding on State’s orders.

Vocational curricula will be revamped to meet market demand and increase the involvement of businesses. In addition to supplying a number of foreign vocational programmes, a training programme for experimental engineers will also be devised .

The above-mentioned solutions are intended to provide vocational training to more than 24 million people by 2020 and to bring the rate of trained workers to 55 percent.

Under the scheme, the nation will have 540 vocational training schools and colleges, including 30 colleges meeting regional and global standards, and have 40,000 teachers by 2020.

The scheme will need almost 41.3 trillion VND (2.29 billion USD) which is expected to be mobilised from the State budget and official development assistance (ODA) capital, as well as businesses and students.

For his part, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan emphasised the necessity of raising the quality of vocational training instructors and of providing special vocational programmes for guest workers in order to increase the competitiveness of Vietnamese labour in international labour market.

The ministry also said that although there are 306 vocational colleges and schools which have enrolled more than 1.5 million students, the figure has failed to meet market demand. The rate of trained workers only reached 26.5 percent in 2008.

According to the World Bank’s assessment, the quality of Vietnam ’s human resources ranks 11th among 12 participating Asian nations and none of its vocational schools offers high-quality training that meets regional and global standards./.