The National Training Council under the Ministry of Labour & Industrial Relations has convened a two-day workshop to discuss and formulate a National Coordination centre of Overseas Scholarships.

The workshop and overseas scholarships exhibitions are part of the implementation of Government and NEC decision no. 181/2022 of the National Training Policy 2022-2032 (NTP) by the NTC in collaboration with key stakeholders.

NTC Director, Kinsella Geoffrey explained that the workshop includes donor funded overseas scholarships because there are a lot of overseas scholarships, and people might get confused

“But here we narrowing it down to only donor funded overseas scholarships. So the most popular ones are ‘Australian Awards and New Zealand scholarship. These are the most popular ones that we know, but you must also remember that there are other countries doing the same thing but we don’t know. Our people don’t know.

So that’s one of the objectives of having this workshop. We can identify other countries so that our people can have a choice, employers have a choice to make, organizations have a choice to make.” Kinsella Geoffrey said.

The two-day workshop was opened today by the Secretary for Labour & Industrial Relations and Chair of the National Training Council, George Taunakekei.

“Overseas scholarships as you have heard from the director himself, is a key policy area. It’s identified in the government’s National Training Policy 2022-2032 and as highlighted in the NTP, a significant source of training in Papua New Guinea is provided through scholarships provided by a range of organisations including government, private sector organisations, NGOs, churches and AID donors. Often these are the only way our citizens are given the opportunity to study. However currently there is no central coordination of those scholarships in Papua New Guinea.

Individual agencies and donor organisations offer a range of scholarships without reference to any clearly identified National Skills priority areas,” said George Taunakekei.

Therefore there’s a need to review and analyse all scholarships on offer with a view to ensuring resources are directed to the most needed skills areas.

Scholarship patrons also presented their objectives and activities. They included Australia Award, JICA, and China.

The workshop will continue tomorrow with a roadshow of all stakeholders at the Taurama Aquatic Centre.