Need for lakhs of trainers to skill to 50 crore people: Skill Development Secretary Ravi Mital

There is a growing need of lakhs of trainers to impart skills knowledge to about 50 crore people, says Ravi Mital, the Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Secretary. He said the role of trainers is key in promoting skills.

“About 50 crore people needs to be skilled in next few years and if we have to take India to the next level, skilling our people is absolutely essential and in this regard the role of our trainers becomes more important,” Mital said during the announcement of Kaushalacharya Awards 2021, honoring skill trainers. “We have to create an army of hundreds of thousands and lakhs of trainers because they will need to train 50 crore people.”

Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Minister Dharmendra Pradhan called for focusing on standardization of trainers and finding of demands in both domestic and world markets for skilled people. “In schools, there are 26 crore seats, and 10 crore teachers, so if we have to train 50 crore, imagine how many trainers and master trainers we need,” he said. “Training should be in local language and trainers should explain things in mother tongue to student to enhance the scope of skilling.”

Key for government to support development of skills

The OECD, in a report “An assessment of the impact of COVID-19 on job and skills demand using online job vacancy data” in April 2021, stated that when looking at the underlying skills mentioned in job postings, evidence from all countries analyzed show a strong increase in the demand for technical competencies in the healthcare sector, such as emergency and intensive care, or basic patient care. Relative to the pre-crisis period, transversal skills such as communication skills or team work also remain in strong demand among the top most frequently advertised positions in the labor market.

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It is therefore, key for governments to support the development of skills that foster individuals’ resilience by meeting the demand from labor markets. In the medium run, labor market and social policies will need to adapt to a rapidly changing landscape and policy interventions will need to be adjusted in line with the evolution of the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and be tailored to each country’s institutional and economic structure.