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APEC Ministers Endorse Brunei's Initiative To Nurture New Economy Skills
APEC Ministers Sunday endorsed a new initiative led by Brunei to nurture skills for the new economy era.
The initiative was mapped out in the report "Human Capacity Building in APEC" presented to APEC ministers by Brunei's Acting Foreign Minister Princess Masna at the ongoing two-day APEC ministerial meeting.
Brunei's initiative calls on APEC to play a more effective role in human resources development by working with the business and training sectors to establish the technology, infrastructure and scale of human capacity building that will be required, and by removing policy impediments.
Recognizing that regional economies face a new and demanding environment arising from rapid economic and structural change, the spread of information technology, and the greater knowledge- intensive demands of industry, the report said the fruits of future economic success will depend very much on the capacity of people to acquire and use knowledge and on their ability to cope with change.
The report identifies, among central concerns, the rising cost of quality formal education, the need for constant upgrading of training skills, the need for continuing skill development in the workplace, the importance of higher quality education for rural communities, and the importance of creating education opportunities for vulnerable populations, all difficult issues in every economy.
The report said they are especially challenging in developing economies where both financial and training resources are limited and where the development gap between urban and provincial and rural communities is even more marked.
The report notes that information and communications technologies provide a revolutionary means to take high-quality education and training, and capacity building in general, to the widest spectrum of people and at a much lower marginal cost than traditional methods.
Brunei's report urges APEC to go beyond customary avenues of cooperation among government officials and with non-governmental organizations to build new links with private-sector entities to meet the challenges of human resource development.
The key to utilizing the new technologies to deliver the full range of human capacity building needs on a sufficient scale will be establishing new and innovative partnerships between governments, the business sector and the training sector, it says.
The report also recommends APEC improve its internal coordination of human resources development efforts and raise awareness of those efforts so it can have a greater impact on the direction of HRD in the region.
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