RECORDER REPORT

LAHORE: Chairman Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority (Tevta) Irfan Qaiser Sheikh said that around 350,000 students registered with world’s sixth and Pakistan’s first online Skilled Labour Market Information System (SLMIS) in just three years.

“SLMIS is playing its role in eliminating unemployment from largest province of Pakistan as well providing job opportunities to youngsters.”

Talking to a meeting of officials regarding performance of SLMIS here on Tuesday, Irfan Qaiser sheikh said that since its launched in 2015 SLMIS had facilitated thousands of TEVTA pass outs who not only got jobs in Pakistani market but SLMIS helped them in getting jobs in foreign countries like Saudi Arabia, UAE and other Gulf countries.

He said that three years ago, there were several online job portals which were working but none of them were focusing the youth having technical and vocational education. After studying these portals, it was decided that a portal should be established which do fulfil the needs of the youngster who have technical and vocational education, he added.

Irfan further said since its inception; SLMIS had not only provided jobs information but also guided the students about the employers and other job related information. He said through that portal they could know the jobs available in technical and vocational sector while sitting anywhere in the world. “This is especially for the youngsters belonging to rural areas,” he added.

He said that in just three years 369,684 students were registered with the SLMIS whereas around 35,000 employers had been registered who were providing and updating their jobs at the portal. “These employers not only local but several international employers are also updating their jobs in this portal.”

Talking about SLMIS, he said TEVTA pass outs could submit their particulars for SLMIS developed by TEVTA Punjab, this information system is providing key information on Punjab’s labour market including market trends, skill training opportunities in different trades and technologies, data of passing out students and job seekers as well as vacancies for technical persons in the industry.

Irfan said the facility of free registration was available for all the students of technical and vocational institutes, job seekers and employers on that web portal so that unemployed skilled youth may find suitable job opportunities.

“This web portal is also providing information on employment and unemployment rates in different sectors of industry besides other useful economic data. At present, UK, Korea, Malaysia, Philippine and Sri Lanka are using labour market information systems and all these systems have been studied in development of SLMIS by Punjab TEVTA.

Chairperson TEVTA said SLMIS is being operated and maintained at TEVTA Secretariat. The labour market information of whole Punjab is consolidated at TEVTA secretariat in coordination with its district level offices.