Experts suggest ways to develop rural workers’ vocational skills
An official from the EU Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has suggested several policies on health care and education to develop vocational skills for rural workers in Vietnam at a recent workshop in Hanoi.
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Special Assistant to the Chief Operating Officer at the OECD Development Centre Ji-Yeun Rim said that it is necessary to revise vocational training programmes in line with businesses’ requirements to expand job opportunities for youngsters and to develop the working environment in agricultural small-and medium-sized enterprises.
She recommended raising awareness among youths of building rural policies and creating venues for innovation exchange.
Meanwhile, Director of the Institute of Labour Science and Social Affairs Dao Quang Vinh suggested increasing cooperation with businesses to ensure jobs for graduates and implementing policies to attract and support youngsters with vocational training.
He also proposed developing career guidance activities and improving the quality of training programmes.
According to Ji-Yeun Rim, youngsters make up nearly 30 percent of Vietnam’s total population, 70 percent of whom live in rural areas.
The proportion of young people is decreasing and Vietnam is entering the aging population period, she said.
Around 10 percent of Vietnamese children quit primary and secondary schools. Those aged 5-17 never going to school is 2.6 percent, mainly from ethnic minority groups and poor households in the Mekong Delta.
Only 72 percent of youngsters in ethnic minority areas are literate, while the proportion in disadvantaged regions is 77 percent.
The Mekong Delta has the worst occupational index for young people. Meanwhile, the Red River Delta and the southeastern region are home to the biggest proportion of young salary earners, and the lowest is reported in the Central Highlands and the northern mountainous region.
