Only 40% of workers of foreign-invested enterprises are trained vocationally. The vocational training structure is also a problem.

That was the assessment of the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) at a recent workshop on human resource development and labour relations in Japanese enterprises in Vietnam held by the General Department of Vocational Training and the Japan Overseas Vocational Training Association.

FDI enterprises and vocational training schools are located in almost provinces and cities of Vietnam.

However, according to Mac Van Tien, Director of the Research Centre on Vocational Sciences under the General Department of Vocational Training, the weakness of vocational training schools is their teaching tools lag far behind the development of technology of FDI enterprises. Their vocational training programme covers many fields and they cannot meet the need for special trainings of FDI companies.

To deal with the situation, some FDI enterprises have set up their own vocational training schools, for example the Dung Quat Vocational Training School in the Dung Quat Industrial Zone, the Vietnam - Singapore Vocational Training Centre in the Vietnam - Singapore Industrial Zone and the Semi-public Technology College in the Linh Trung Industrial Zone.

FDI enterprises also organise short-term vocational training courses or re-train their workers on-site to immediately meet their requirements.

Surveys show that 44% of FDI enterprises have to re-train around 30% of their workers at different levels. They even send workers who work at key stages of production lines abroad for training.

The advantage of vocational training at industrial zones is that the training programmes are suitable to the real situation of enterprises and workers have opportunities to practice with up-to-date equipment.

However, this form of training shows disadvantages in teaching methodology and experience. Workers are only trained with what the enterprises need so they will face difficulties when they change jobs.

According to MPI statistics, by the end of October 2006 Vietnam had 6,761 effective FDI projects totaling US$57.3 billion of registered capital. Japan is the third-largest investing country in Vietnam with around $7.1 billion and 724 effective projects.

The localities that have drawn the highest number of FDI projects are HCM City, 196 projects; Hanoi, 139; Dong Nai, 55; Binh Duong, 54; and Hai Phong, 139.

Kotaro Uchiyama, General Director of the Staley Electrics Co, Ltd in Vietnam, said that before coming to Vietnam, investors know that human resources in Vietnam are abundant, intelligent and hard-working. But in fact they face a lot of difficulties in terms of labour quality. As a result, Japanese investors have to re-train local workers, both in vocation and language.

Fumitomi Suda, General Director of the Niss Electrics Co, Ltd in Vietnam, also shared this opinion, saying that teamwork was one of the weakest points of Vietnamese labourers.

Sharing some experiences in vocational training for FDI enterprises, particularly workers of Japanese-invested firms in Vietnam, Kotaro Uchiyama said that Vietnam needed to develop its network of grassroots vocational training units to meet the need for human resources of FDI enterprises, and particularly encourage FDI firms to establish vocational training units.

In the 2006-2010 period, Vietnam aims to have around 7.5 million people trained vocationally.

Source: VNECONOMY