Dr. Naim Yaakub, CPSC Director General, talked on the role of International Organizations in the UNESCO-UNEVOC Regional Forum for the Asia and the Pacific at the UNESCO Hall of the UNESCO Secretariat in Seoul, Republic of Korea from September 4-6. 2013.

This forum gathered 48 TVET administrators and practitioners from all over the region with a general aim of “Advancing TVET for Youth Employability and Sustainability”. The forum is a regional effort organized to further strengthen global and regional harmonization for the advancement of TVET transformation through the capacities of UNEVOC’s global network of specialized TVET institutions and affiliated partners. The key output of this forum is to create a Regional Forum report as an input to the UNESCO-UNEVOC plan of action to be presented in 2014 at their headquarters in Bonn, Germany.

The forum’s objectives are the following:

  1. Provide a platform to showcase innovative and evidence-based regional promising practices in the fields of Youth and Skills and Greening TVET
  2. Address the topics Youth and Skills and Greening TVET through high-level international and regional expertise and panel discussions
  3. Reinforce and extend regional networks and partnerships for the advancement of TVET transformation towards regional harmonization and resource mobilization;
  4. Further strengthen the UNEVOC Network consolidation process in the region.

Dr. Naim, in Panel 4 of the program, presented CPSC’s role in enhancing and greening TVET in the region. He specifically outlined CPSC’s core activities, program offerings and projects that are implemented to its network of member countries. He also presented several important updates on the CPSC Green Project which was seen as one of its landmark activities in promoting sustainability and environmental sensitivity.

Other key TVET players who addressed the forum include the Director of Basic Learning and Skills Development at UNESCO, Dr.Mmantsetsa Marope, the Head of UNESCO-UNEVOC, Dr. Shyamal Majumdar; the Head of UNESCO Regional Office in Bangkok, Dr. Kim Gwong-Jo; the President of KRIVET, Dr. Young-bum Park, from GIZ Magdeburg, Dr. Harry Stolte, and other important personnel from the International Labor Organization (ILO) and UNESCO Regional Offices.

The forum achieved its expected outcomes which are: (1) to strengthen multi-stakeholder partnerships and cooperation, (2) recognize and promote the importance of regional harmonization as a means to streamline regional TVET priorities and (3) enable the participants to better measure and act on TVET development issues in the outlined priority areas.

Below are some pictures from the program: