Manpower launches own program of apprenticeship

TANGERANG, West Java (JP): The Ministry of Manpower is introducing industrial apprenticeship programs using vocational training centers it runs as the basis.

Yesterday, Director General for Manpower Training and Productivity Andy Sangadji Rachman inaugurated the scheme at PT Gunadjaja Indah, a sack manufacturing company which is one of the first companies to be enlisted into the program.

The scheme were launched yesterday for 142 workers who are now training at vocational centers in Jakarta, Tangerang and Bandung.

Apprenticeship appears to be the name of the game nowadays as the government is pressing on with its human resources development program.

The Ministry of Education and Culture in July also incorporated apprenticeship schemes into the curriculum of technical schools. Minister Wardiman Djojonegoro has already secured pledges of cooperation from more than 6,000 manufacturing companies from all over Indonesia.

Minister of Manpower Abdul Latief formally launched his scheme in East Kalimantan last month. The scheme is intended more for adult workers with little or no skills.

Latief said some 500 workers have already been enlisted for the apprenticeship programs introduced at vocational centers in North Sumatra, South Sumatra, Jakarta, West Java, Central Java, East Java, Bali, West and East Kalimantan.

Skilled workers

The program is the key answer to the low quality of the Indonesian work force, as well as to meet the increasing demand for skilled workers in the labor market, Sangadji said yesterday.

He said skill and experience now count much more at work than a certificate or diploma. "We have an abundance of educated resources, junior and senior high school graduates and university graduates, but many of them are unemployed because they have no skills sought by industries."

He appealed to the business community to participate in the scheme.

"Bear in mind that almost 77 percent of the work force in Indonesia has only primary school backgrounds, or never completed school," he said at the ceremony also attended by representatives of companies which are sponsoring the apprenticeship program.

Under the apprenticeship program, companies are encouraged to recruit trainees and send them to the government-owned vocational training centers as well as provide them with in-house trainings.

An apprenticeship program runs for two years.

Andy Arifin Baso, mail manager PT Gunadjaja Indah, said his company has already recruited 16 workers and enlisted them for the apprenticeship program.

"Despite the high cost, the business world will reap the fruit later," he said. "The 16 workers should acquire skill, a professional attitude and work ethos at the end of the two-year program."

His company has invested in training equipment and in addition is spending around Rp 1.7 million a month to pay for the training instructors and stipends for the 16 trainees.

Ismail, 20, a graduate of a senior technical school, said he was recruited as an apprentice at the state-owned construction firm PT Pembangunan Perumahan.

He said the program has cost him nothing and he has signed a contract for the duration of the apprenticeship program.

"I am satisfied with the apprenticeship scheme because all participants, besides being given basic knowledge, are also sent to work at sponsor companies." (rms)