The labour sector in Kerala is staring at a huge challenge with nearly 40% of the existing jobs likely to turn redundant in another five years, warned Vinod T.V., Chief Operating Officer of the Kerala Academy for Skills Excellence (KASE), State Skill Development Mission and State Skill Secretariat.
Talking to The Hindu at KASE’s stall at the Invest Kerala Global Summit here, Mr. Vinod cited the upskilling, reskilling, redeployment and augmentation for human-humanoid collaboration in a short period being the biggest challenge before KASE.
“That the jobs facing potential redundancy are in the sectors, which employ the biggest workforce after government makes the challenge even more grave. Unless the affected workforce is reskilled and redeployed, the State’s Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) will take a hit. That is already reflected in the LFPR in the State’s traditional sectors like coir and cashew with loss of sustainable and gainful employment round-the-year already a reality,” he said.
Add to that the educated youth and the returning expatriates to the affected workforce and the situation would be even worse. Apart from reskilling and redeployment of that workforce in more gainful sectors, efforts will also have to be made to facilitate human-humanoid collaboration through skill augmentation failing which the economy will suffer and many businesses may shut down.
“This challenging task cannot be done solely by the government but calls for collaboration between public and private agencies. Government will have to play more of the role of a facilitator for providing the right ecosystem in collaboration with the industry,” said Mr. Vinod.
KASE is focusing on developing skilled talents in the 21 sectors prioritised by the State as part of its industrial policy thus drawing more investments into those sectors since talented workforce attracts investments. The idea is to generate local employment opportunities in these sectors, which would also serve as a disincentive to aspirational migration.
“We have already identified industrial working groups in each of these sectors. This arrangement will help to predict the potential changes in these sectors, the skills needed to be developed, courses to be designed, arranging for trainers and facilitating on-the-job training,” said Mr. Vinod.
The majority of the institutions, including arts and science colleges in the State need to reinvent as they can’t continue to train workforce who are not relevant to sectors that are transforming and have huge growth and employment potential, he said.
Published – February 22, 2025 06:59 pm IST