The Labour Minister Nayef Stetieh held today, Thursday, a broad discussion session with the members of the Sector Skills Councils which mostly include members from the private sector under the umbrella of the TVSDC.

The Minister explained that this dialogue stems from the enhancement of private-public sector partnership to identify the needs of the labour market and each sector of the professions required, and accordingly, the priority skills and professional training needs are identified based on the labour market requirements. Further, technical committees stem from such a partnership to identify the skills and competencies required by profession.

He asserted that the Ministry, being a regulator of the labour market, seeks to advance the technical and vocational sector, by working on engaging and including the private sector in implementing and disseminating the work and vocational plans, and enabling the private sector to play a participatory and executive role with regard to vocational training, especially in view of the availability of many opportunities for the Jordanian young people to engage in the vocational labour market, for the university graduates and young people below the university education level.

Stetieh noted that the Ministry, being a regulator of the labour market, is committed to have continuous communications with the private sector to identify the skills needed by various sectors to train Jordanian workforce on such skills that meet the needs of the labour market, which requires not restricting the vocational training mission to certain professions, yet it should cover various professions.

In the end of the dialogue, the Minister commended the partnership with the ILO and its efforts, as well as all other partners.

Dr. Qais Alsfasfeh, Head of the TVSDC, said that the TVSDC was established in 2019 under the directions of His Majesty King Abdullah II, and His Highness Hussein bin Abdullah, Crown Prince of Jordan, in line with the recommendations of the national strategy for human resources development.

Alsfasfeh explained that making the private sector holds the majority of SSC membership is intended to identify the true requirements of the market at the highest accuracy and objectivity levels, and identifying the market’s needs of the training and qualification programs required by profession, especially in the vocational and technical areas, since the private sector has more experience and potential in this area.

Eng. Ehab Al-Qadry, Chairman of the Leather and Textile Industries Sector Skills Council, and representative of the leather and textile industries at Jordan Chamber of Industry, said that the TVSDC and SSCs have been established to achieve alignment with the private sector’s requirements which have been claimed for many years to bridge the gap between the vocational and technical training outputs and the real and actual requirements of the labour market.

He added that this requires joint action and coordination between all parties to the private sector, including employers and trade unions, and the public sector, towards identifying the TVSDC’s courses of action and strategies to ensure the realization of the desired goals rapidly and more effectively.

Eng. Ahmed Albas, Chairman of the Chemical and Cosmetics Industries Sector Skills Council, and representative of the chemical and cosmetics industries at Jordan Chamber of Industry, said that the SSCs constitute a partnership at the profession level, and the chemical industries SSC was established in 2018 and it is among the SSCs that completed the professional standards of this industry, and it serves the food and chemical industry sectors.

He indicated that the Chemical Industries Sector Skills Council set 8 professional standards to be adopted by the TVSDC to produce training syllabus. He pointed out that the private sector should lead the vocational and technical efforts because it is the primary operator of this field.

Mohamed Al-Qassem, Chairman of the Tourism & Hospitality Sector Skills Council, said that the SSCs are distinguished because they are led by the private sector which knows better about the labour market since the private sector is the primary operator.

Al-Qassem explained that these SSCs, including the Tourism & Hospitality Sector Skills Council, are updating the data of the professions required in the labour market, setting professional standards for all professions by sector, and coordinating with all the vocational and technical training providers to reflect such standards on the training syllabus provided by the training providers to provide skilled national manpower trained on the professions and the skills required in the market, and eventually accessing direct employment opportunities.