Mekong Institute (MI) is strengthening capacities of skills development institutes in Myanmar to build a competitive national electronics workforce that will meet demands of prospective Thai investors.  

Supported by the Thailand International Cooperation Agency (TICA), the “Improving Institutional Capacities for Promoting Employability in the Greater Mekong Subregion” online workshop is part of a series of initiatives under the MI-TICA partnership. With the growing aging population in Thailand, along with the government’s preparations for industry 4.0, the country’s workforce is reorienting its skills towards services and technologically-driven jobs. Moreover, Thailand is expected to shift its labor-intensive production sites to Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, and Vietnam (CLMV). In response to this, Thailand and MI have invested in deepening regional cooperation in the area of skills development to build a complementary and robust labor force in CLMV.

From November 30 to December 2, 2020, 10 Myanmar representatives will be exposed to strategies that will enhance the quality of skill development trainings. The sessions will mainly discuss policy and institutional arrangements, as well as progress on national skills standardization and recognition benchmarks.

The workshop will also include a session on the current COVID-19 disruption to the regional labor market, so skills development institutes can better respond to changes in market demands. In addition, the workshop aims to foster partnership building among institutes from Myanmar and Thailand to encourage deeper collaboration in reinforcing opportunities, as well as in addressing labor priorities and needs.

At the end of the three-day workshop, participants will be tasked to implement their action plans to transfer the knowledge and skills gained from the MI workshop to more skills development officials and trainers in Myanmar.