Professional standard a must: Govt

Professional standard a must: Govt

JAKARTA: Minister of Manpower and Transmigration Jacob Nuwa
Wea underlined on Saturday the importance of adopting
international professional standards.

"We have not yet developed competence standards that should be
applied at any work field," Nuwa Wea was quoted by Antara.

Delivering his keynote speech at a seminar on "National
Opportunity and HRD Threats in the Free Market Era", Nuwa Wea
said that despite the current professional quality development
scheme, its contribution was minimal in preparing professional
workers.

He cited as example that out of 1,000 vacancies, only 25
applicants met the required qualifications. "This shows that the
quality of Indonesian workers is very low."

Data shows that of the 210 million-strong population, 100.78
million were workers in 2002. The workforce was dominated at
59.06 percent by workers with a low-level education -- or
elementary school graduates and dropouts -- 17.49 percent by
junior high school graduates, 19.33 percent by senior high school
graduates, 2.21 percent by workers with one, two and three-year
vocational certificates and the remaining 2.69 percent by
university graduates.

In comparison, workers in Thailand, Malaysia and the
Philippines with a university-level education constitute
approximately 10 percent of the workforce. -- Antara