Shas­tri Boodan

GML Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

The Youth Train­ing and Em­ploy­ment Part­ner­ship Pro­gramme (YTEPP) Lim­it­ed is ex­plor­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for greater col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Peo­ple’s Re­pub­lic of Chi­na in youth de­vel­op­ment, tech­ni­cal train­ing and work­force readi­ness.

The dis­cus­sions took place on Thurs­day, Au­gust 20, when a se­nior YTEPP del­e­ga­tion, led by Chair­man Dr Mau­rice Jones, met with Chi­nese Am­bas­sador to Trinidad and To­ba­go Ren Hongyan.

The del­e­ga­tion in­clud­ed Deputy Chair­man Ryan Se­bas­t­ian, Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer Ray­mond Su­ru­jbal­ly, Act­ing Di­rec­tor of the En­ter­prise De­vel­op­ment and Sup­port Ser­vices Di­vi­sion (EDSS) Mont­gomery Guy and Op­er­a­tions Di­rec­tor Keon Stephen­son.

Dis­cus­sions fo­cused on po­ten­tial ar­eas of co­op­er­a­tion in youth de­vel­op­ment, skills train­ing, em­ploy­ment and en­tre­pre­neur­ship.

YTEPP of­fi­cials high­light­ed the po­ten­tial ben­e­fits of draw­ing on Chi­na’s tech­no­log­i­cal ca­pa­bil­i­ties, tech­ni­cal ex­per­tise, in­no­va­tion and in­ter­na­tion­al ex­pe­ri­ence to ex­pand op­por­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple and help build a more skilled and adapt­able work­force.

The or­gan­i­sa­tion said col­lab­o­ra­tion could sup­port ini­tia­tives that equip young peo­ple with rel­e­vant tech­ni­cal and en­tre­pre­neur­ial skills, im­prove their em­ploy­ment prospects and pre­pare them for an in­creas­ing­ly tech­nol­o­gy-dri­ven econ­o­my.

Both sides agreed to con­tin­ue dis­cus­sions and ex­plore prac­ti­cal ar­eas in which co­op­er­a­tion could be de­vel­oped.

YTEPP said it looks for­ward to deep­en­ing its en­gage­ment with Chi­na as it works to de­vel­op ini­tia­tives aimed at prepar­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go’s youth for fu­ture em­ploy­ment and en­tre­pre­neur­ial op­por­tu­ni­ties.