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Newly appointed BIT faces uphill struggle
The newly appointed Board of Industrial Training (BIT) yesterday met for the fist time under the chairmanship of former Minister of Education, Dr Dale Bisnauth at the conference room of the Ministry of Labour on Cornhill Street.
The Board will face an uphill struggle given that the preferred turnover of apprentices coming out of hands-on training programmes conducted by BIT is far from desired.
To compound the situation, there are currently only three companies under BIT that caters for apprenticeship programmes—Guyana Power and Light, Guyana Sugar Corporation and Guyana National Industrial Company.
The members of the newly appointed Board include Alfred King, Colwyn King, Denis Jaikaran, Clinton Williams, Michael Turner, Rosemarie Terborg-Davis and Dr Nanda Kishore Gopaul.
Speaking at the inaugural meeting, Labour Minister Manzoor Nadir said that during the glory days of BIT at least 1,000 persons were churned out each year as qualified persons in different fields of work.
The Board will be tasked with executing the National Training Project for Youth Empowerment launched by President Bharrat Jagdeo in 2005 with an aim to have in excess of 5,000 persons trained each year.
The goal is yet to be attained hence the reason to have the programme under the auspices of BIT to complement its batches of trained apprentices.
Nadir added that unlike in the past where the programme was hindered because of funding, this is currently not the case given that the National Assembly has already approved some $100M for the Programme.
The apprenticeship programme is geared primarily at school dropouts, unemployed youths or those with little or no secondary education among others.
One example of the process occurs with the Ministry of Culture Youth and Sport in conjunction with GNIC and GPL.
Every year hundreds of persons between the ages of 16 and 25 are trained under the Youth Entrepreneurial Skills Training Programme at the end of which GPL and GNIC will provide hands-on apprenticeship tenure for some of the youths.
Nadir told the Board members that a positive change is expected in order to fulfill the mandate of giving vulnerable young people another chance at having a marketable skill.
Dr Bisnauth, the Chairman of the Board, acknowledged the fact that only three enterprises were on board with the programme. He said that that issue will have to be tackled aggressively.
“We will have our jobs cut out for us in trying to grab the interest of people in taking apprentices.”
In an attempt to significantly add to the work force the Board will also be addressing the length of the training tenure to have shorter, more compact programmes.
According to Nadir, measures will also soon be put in place to ensure that persons trained by the government are bound to operate in Guyana; this is expected to tackle the issue of brain drain that has severely affected Guyana.
This has already been approved by Cabinet, according to Nadir, and soon the necessary regulations will be addressed.
BIT is a statutory body that has been in existence since 1910 and is the only body authorised to certify an enterprise to take on persons for apprenticeship training. The Board currently has a life of three years.
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