India and Australia on Friday signed agreements for cooperation in the education and skills sector in the presence of Human Resource Development Minister M M Pallam Raju and Australia’s Acting High Commissioner to India Bernard Philip.
On the ocassion coinciding with the visit of a 100-member Australian delegation to India, Raju said the Australian India Education Council, set up earlier, provides a good framework to do this across all levels in the education and skill training programme. “It is for all of you to sit together and work together to be able to develop entrepreneurial and sustainable models that result in great opportunities for training providers in both the countries,” he said.
“We support this partnership and I hope it will continue to expand in scope, scale and speed and build cooperation that will transform the lives of millions of young people. What could really be exciting is we could have five to six Australian training providers invest in India either in collaboration or directly to contribute to skill development efforts in India,” the HRD minister said. Raju said the cooperation between the NSDC and Australian Industry Business Councils is gaining good synergy and momentum towards skill partnerships.
“India needs to train up to 500 million people by 2022, and is projected to add 12 to 15 million workers to its labour force every year over the coming decades. Quality training delivery and standards will be essential and Australia is well positioned to provide this expertise,” said Bernard Philip.
“I am confident that our work with Australia under the Australia India Education Council is contributing to novel skills partnerships that will help India leverage its favourable demographics for achieving faster and more inclusive growth” said Dilip Chenoy, MD and CEO of the National Skill Development Corporation.