MELAKA: The private sector has been invited to participate in the development of technical and vocational schools to provide adequate manpower and human capital capable of driving the country’s economic sector and turn Malaysia into a developed nation.
Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said that in the next 10 years, Malaysia was projected to require 3.3 million trained and knowledgeable manpower with the special skills to meet the demand of the country’s major economic sectors.
“With the collaboration between the public and private sectors to develop technical and vocational schools, we will be able to utilize the facilities provided and send a larger number of students (to take up vocational education).
“This can also resolve the shortage (of skilled manpower) which we will face in the next five to 10 years,” he said.
Speaking at the launch of the Melaka Educational Fair here yesterday, Muhyiddin who is also the Education Minister, said currently only 10 per cent of the total number of students in the country’s education system were in the vocational and technical streams.
He said about 60 per cent of the student population in some other countries studied in vocational streams that were needed to fill up the requirement of the main economic sectors to develop the country.
As such, he said the government was focusing its efforts on implementing the educational transformation programme which also stressed on increasing manpower who were considered to be trained in the main economic sectors.
“We had announced earlier that we are targeting to increase (the number of students in the vocational and technical streams) from 10 per cent to 20 per cent within the next five years…this is a major challenge for us.
“This is where the role of the public and private sectors to assist in the development of the country’s educational sector will become more important,” he said. — Bernama