Hanoi (VNA) – Economic and social experts have stressed the necessity to raisethe quality of human resources, thus improving the labour productivity andpromoting sustainable development in the country.

Accordingto Chairman of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) Vu Tien Loc,labour quality is a great pressure for Vietnam as this is one of factors toVietnam’s sustainable development in the future.

Education reform has become an important requirement, he said, noting that educationand training in universities has to meet the market’s demand.

At workshops on human resources quality improvement, economists said it isnecessary to apply a range of feasible and effective solutions to improve thequality of human resources towards the increase of labour productivity, thecapacity of business management, thus raising the competitiveness of theeconomy, especially in the context of intensive and multi-dimensional internationaleconomic integration.

Associateprofessor PhD. Pham Van Son, director of the Education Ministry's SupportCentre for Manpower Training and Supply, Vietnam's labour force has a greatopportunity to participate in the regional and world labour allocation process.

He, however, stressed that in order to achieve this goal, it is necessary to raisethe quality of human resources in a variety of ways, such as improving educationallevel and labour skills, encouraging self-study, developing talents andbuilding learning society, and combining the human resources developmentstrategy and the socio-economic development strategy.

"In order not to fall far behind, Vietnam needs to innovate human resourcestraining, while devising appropriate mechanisms, policies and solutions toquickly better the quality of current human resources”, he said.

This is a long-term and vital strategy to sustainably develop the high-qualitylabour force, meeting the country’s industrialisation, modernisation andinternational integration, he affirmed.

Experts also underlined the need to improve not only specialised knowledge, butalso foreign language and other knowledge, saying that this is important for Vietnam’sinternational integration target.

According to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), skilled humanresources with good education and foreign language ability, particularlyEnglish, will be prioritised to freely work in ASEAN member nations. Inaddition, labourers can find suitable jobs and receive additional skillstraining.

Accordingto the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA), a number ofindustries bring opportunities for labourers to collaborate with small andmedium sized companies in other countries. However, the professional level ofthe workforce must meet the requirements set by those companies.

In a recent report by VCCI, 60 percent of foreign direct investment (FDI)enterprises said they would continue to expand their business in Vietnam.

However, the issue of labour quality is their concern. Vietnam is attractingmore and more FDI due to the advantages of institutional stability, large-scalemarket, abundant workforce, cheap labour cost, the report said-VNA