New campaign to promote dignity of professions like carpenters, welders
While there is a lot of discrimination and disrespect for some of the jobs people do in Sri Lanka, the need for more hands in these jobs in the workforce is growing.
These are jobs like carpenters, welders, painters or plumbers, many who come from outside Colombo. There is no dignity of labour for these professions although they are as important as any other white collar job.
People need to be educated in order to get rid of this negative mindset towards certain jobs and move out of the circle of judging a person’s dignity by evaluating the job he or she does.
Last Tuesday, a national mass media campaign ‘Ekata / Onraa’ was launched at the Bishops College Auditorium in Colombo aimed at removing such discrimination. The initial investment for the campaign was made by the government of Canada through World University Service of Canada.
High Commissioner of Canada to Sri Lanka and Maldives Shelley Whiting, speaking at her last few events before completing her assignment here, told the Business Times that there is a lot of talent in the youth outside Colombo which is not much recognised. People’s perception of skilled labour need to change, she noted while adding that every job category should be given equal respect without any discrimination.
Minister of Skills Development and Vocational Training, Chandima Weerakkody at the event stated that lots of upcoming millennial are reluctant to become a carpenter, electrician, plumber or welder. The thinking has to change. “Our target is to make our students go to any part of the world up-skilled. The challenge is to attract the youth into these sectors which have been left out completely,” said Mr. Weerakkody. The government has plans to provide free vocational training from this year to aspiring students, he added.
He also mentioned that five million job vacancies will be created in different sectors in Japan by 2020 while 80 million around the world by 2020.
The campaign was launched under the theme “Skill up Sri Lanka” and aims to address the urgent issue of skilled labour shortages in growing sectors of the country’s economy by raising awareness about the value and importance of careers in these sectors. The campaign is an open platform through which key stakeholders are encouraged to join in order to ensure that the message is spread throughout the country.
The campaign mainly targets four sectors including light engineering and automotive, construction, hospitality and tourism and information and communication technology.
The unemployment rate among youth between the age 20 and 24 is 21.2 per cent which is the highest among all age groups. The campaign hopes to increase the number of young men and women including people with disabilities and youth affected by war to enter the labour market in these growing industries.