Government and ADB sign grant deal worth $100 million to boost workers’ skills
The government and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) recently signed an agreement for a $10 million grant to help scale up skills training for young workers to boost income and productivity. The Government of Switzerland provided the grant which will be administered by ADB. Economic Relations Division (ERD) Joint Secretary Saifuddin Ahmed and Kazuhiko Higuchi, Country Director of Bangladesh Resident Mission, ADB signed the agreement on behalf of the government and ADB respectively.
Siroco Messerli, deputy director of cooperation of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Dhaka attended the event. This assistance is part of the $30 million grant that the Government of Switzerland has planned to contribute to the Skills for Employment Investment Programme. The investment program is implemented by the Government of Bangladesh through the Ministry of Finance. The investment program will be implemented over 7 years.
“The assistance provided by the Government of Switzerland will support Bangladesh’s efforts to become a middle-income country by raising workers’ skills, productivity and income,” said Country Director Kazuhiko Higuchi. The assistance under the first tranche of the investment program will target 40,000 women and disadvantaged people, including those with disabilities. It will also support 32 public training institutions under Ministry of Education, Ministry of Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment, and Ministry of Industries; nine industry associations; a microcredit organisation (Palli-Karma Sahayak Foundation); and Bangladesh Bank.
The investment programme will equip over 1.25 million youths with employable skills by 2021 through a strong involvement of the private sector. The investment programme will support skills training in 15 priority sectors, starting with six sectors: garments and textiles, leather, construction, light engineering, information technology, and shipbuilding. A major target of the investment program is to boost job placement to around 70 per cent from about 40 per cent now through performance based funding.
The investment programme is estimated to cost a total of $1.07 billion. In addition to $30 million from the Government of Switzerland and the $350 million ADB assistance, the investment programme is expected to be complemented by $200 million from the Government of Bangladesh, $400 million from other development partners, and $90 million from the private sector. The first tranche of the ADB loan is $100 million.
