His Excellency Chris Vihruri, CPSC Governing Board Vice-Chairman and Ambassador of Papua New Guinea to the Philippines, officiates the inaugural ceremonies of the CPSC Senior Administrators’ Conference (SAC) held on April 15, 2013 at CPSC, Manila, Philippines. SAC, gathering top and senior policy makers and administrators from member countries, is set to firm up and fortify the drafted CPSC Corporate Plan 2013-2018 from April 15-17, 2013 at CPSC for final approval of the CPSC Governing Board.

In his keynote address, Excellency Vihruri espoused that in order to fulfill CPSC’s dream, the delegates representing their respective governments, must ensure that the CPSC CorPlan comprises coherent, suitable, realistic, innovative, efficient and achievable strategies, goals and objectives to respond to the emerging challenges of the future that will bring a lasting impact to TVET systems in the region. In addition, he said that the CorPlan must be a living document and a product of the convergence of the minds that truly reflects the different needs of its member countries such that CPSC’s vision is geared towards providing programs and projects that bring about the needed skills of the workforce to enable them to be gainfully employed and facilitate mobilization of workers.

The Director General of CPSC, Dr. Mohammad Naim Yaakub delightedly welcomed all the inaugural guests and delegates and conveyed his high appreciation for gracing the event especially to the GB Vice-Chair for his unrelenting support to CPSC’ activities. He also emphasized his profound gratitude for the meaningful presence of the ten member country representatives from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand. He further added that the this five-year CorPlan is aimed to chart future directions for TVET with focus on key important paradigm shifts which include sustainable development, innovations in the digital age, quality assurance and inclusivity in CPSC’s advocacy for a better world to live in.

The SAC is the third phase of the four-tier CPSC Corporate Planning exercise with initial undertakings through the training needs survey generated online and was completed on October 15, 2012. Results of the survey and feedback from member countries were discussed during the second phase that was the Eminent Experts’ Group Meeting (EEGM) held from November 5 to 9, 2013. The eminent experts’ group drafted the CPSC CorPlan 2013-2018 integrated the results of the survey and feedback from member countries signifying the principle of a consultative process that CPSC adheres to. The drafted CPSC CorPlan 2013-2018 is now being placed before the delegates of the SAC for further review and validation to place it for consideration of the CPSC Governing Board.

The three-day conference also features lead paper presentations of His Excellency Amit Dasgupta, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Embassy of the Republic of India and Mr. Ronald Gaspar, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Coordinating Officer and Education Sector Head of the Toyota Motor Philippines Foundation.

Dr. Hazrat Hussain, CPSC Faculty Consultant and SAC Coordinator imparted a vote of thanks during the inaugural program and provided the overview and details of activities for the conference. Dr. Hazrat will handle overall facilitation of the conference with the assistance of Dr. Godelyn Hisole, CPSC Faculty Specialist, as Facilitator.

To officially signal the start of the draft CorPlan 2013-2018 review, Excellency Vihruri did the honor of putting the golf ball at the conference room during the inaugural event to start the "ball rolling" so to speak.


The delegates of the Senior Administrators' Conference during the review of the Corplan 2013-2018.


His Excellency Chris Vihruri, CPSC GB Vice-Chairman and Ambassador of Papua New Guinea to the Philippines (right) receives a token of appreciation from CPSC Director General, Dr. Naim.