Cabinet has approved the creation of a vocational higher-education institution with the stated aims of producing skilled workers, training young people and reducing the country’s reliance on expatriate workers.
With invention of the new institute, to be called ‘Maldives Polytechnic’, programs currently run by the Maldives Institute of Vocational Education Training (MIVET) and and the Faculty of Engineering Technology will be folded into the one institution.
Press secretary for the president’s office Mohamed Zuhair said the majority of workers in the Maldives with skills in specific fields, notably trades, are foreigners. He said the government intended to reduce the number of foreign workers by training skilled people locally.
”It will even make it easy for the government to provide services for people,” he said.
The new polytechnic would provide high-level jobs for trainers and educators, he added.
President of MIVET advisory council Shafeea Zubair said that the main aim of the Maldives Polytechnic was to involve young people in the country’s economy, helping unemployed youths to train and get jobs.
“The majority of young people are unemployed,” she said, “because they get their basic needs provided by their family. This is the culture of the country, and it needs to be stopped.”
She said when the polytechnic starts operating all the program conducted by Faculty of Engineering and MIVET would come under the institute to allow the Maldives College of Higher Education to evolve into a university.
The educational development would help diversify the economy beyond fishing and tourism, she said.
“The Maldivian economy is based on fishing and tourism, only a few prefer working in these fields,” she said.
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