Asean must strengthen collaboration in skills training to meet the demands of the 21st-century economy, says Human Resources Minister Steven Sim.
In his opening remarks at the Asean TVET Conference (ATVET) 2025 on Wednesday (Aug 13), Sim said the region’s varying levels of industrialisation and unique sectoral strengths create opportunities for member nations to complement and support one another.
00:00Eddie, I think Eddie is here for a round of applause as well.
00:04I've always said, my dear friends, that ASEAN needs to have a more collaborative approach towards the 21st century economy.
00:10We are talking about AI, digitalisation, the green agenda.
00:15Competition between friends and neighbours may not be zero-sum.
00:19Otherwise, we will be all racing to the bottom, where competition is to see who is cheaper in ASEAN.
00:25No, I believe we can partner together to increase the value of our respective national economy,
00:31tackle global problems together, build local competency and drive green growth in this region.
00:36And this was indeed the spirit of Kuala Lumpur 2045,
00:40when our leaders met about three months ago here in Kuala Lumpur to renew the ASEAN commitment.
00:46Commitment not only to work together, but also to work together closely and deeply,
00:52as well as, for the long term, looking at least into 20 years in the future.
00:58We should leverage on our core competencies, for example, to develop an ASEAN EV industry,
01:03rather than allowing investors to push us to a competition to the bottom,
01:09to throw price and to see who is the cheapest.
01:12And we have done it, my dear friends.
01:14With the ASEAN standards for grid financing, the ASEAN power grid,
01:18ASEAN digital economy framework agreement, etc.
01:20And we have done it more recently, with a real-time cross-border payment via the ASEAN e-payment integration.
01:27There is no stopping us from doing the same, collaborating in our EV industry,
01:33in our cheap sectors, for our green economy and even for our skills training sector.
01:39What can we do vis-à-vis skills training at Tibet?
01:42First, ASEAN should be a platform to share our experiences in skills training.
01:49The different stages of our industrialization and the different sectors of which each of us has our respective competitive advantages
01:57will enable us to complement one another.
02:00Take, for example, Malaysia.
02:01We have more than half a century of experience when it comes to high-tech semiconductor manufacturing.
02:08Today, we are 7% of global semiconductor trade and 13% of global semiconductor back-end manufacturing.
02:15As our economy catches up to an even higher growth and higher value model,
02:20we aspire to be a world-class skills training center to ensure our human capital is ready to embrace a higher value job market.
02:29The Malaysian unique national experience will surely be useful to fellow member states who are perhaps exploring a similar path.
02:37And Malaysia too can benefit from our neighbors.
02:40Secondly, to fully realize the potential of ASEAN, we must move towards a long-overdue, higher synergy in the common certification framework.
02:50If skills are the currency of Industrial Revolution 4.0, IR 4.0,
02:56then in order for a greater advancement of the ASEAN skills market, we must work hard towards mutual recognition.
03:03Perhaps it is time for an ASEAN skills clearinghouse, a regional standard authority to enable trans-border recognition of national skills standard.
03:13The low-hanging fruit, because the Deputy Prime Minister reminded me, is to strengthen the existing ASEAN-Tibet Council to do more.
03:21Here in Malaysia, we are in the process of amending our skills development legislation to recognize higher T-Bet qualifications
03:29beyond the current ceiling of an advanced diploma in T-Bet.
03:33This will include consultant and expert level of skills certification.
03:38And this certification will definitely fulfill any stringent regional or even global standards.
03:44There is no reason why these experts here in Malaysia cannot move freely to contribute their knowledge and skills within the region.
03:53Thirdly, we must put our money where our mouth is to invest in skills education.
03:58The Malaysian government spends about 10 billion ringgit, you know, the region of 2.4 billion dollars a year on T-Bet and skills education.
04:09If this is an average across ASEAN, then we are looking at about 100 billion ringgit or 24 billion US dollars.
04:16Annual government outlay just for T-Bet and skills training alone.
04:20And I am not counting the conventional academic or education funding.
04:26Yes, each member state has our own strength and core competencies.
04:31And also our national interests, right?
04:34But what is stopping us from developing a deeper collaboration to amplify our resources through pulling them together?
04:41Two months ago, in line with this spirit of sharing resources, and also in conjunction with the ASEAN years of skills 2025,
04:50Malaysia opened up our national training week for the first time to citizens of ASEAN beyond our borders.
04:57With a record-breaking number of participants at 3.5 million people all over ASEAN,
05:0310 times the number of participants last year,
05:07Malaysia offered over 72,000 free skills training courses valued at RM400 million to Malaysian citizens and fellow citizens of ASEAN.
05:21This is a demonstration of Malaysia's commitment to upskill ourselves and to collaborate with our neighbours to upskill our region.
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