Through the assistance of the European Social Fund, 200 workers who are currently employed in the manufacturing industry will receive basic IT training to assist them in the eventual changeover to the ICT industry, Investments, Industry and IT Minister Austin Gatt said

yesterday.

Speaking at a press conference to launch the initiative, Minister Gatt said that the country’s greatest challenge is to provide enough skilled persons to staff the expected growth in the IT industry as more foreign investment in this sector continues to pour in.

“The reality today is that the manufacturing sector is in decline and it is thanks to a Nationalist government that the country is rapidly expanding in the high-end industries and is moving away from low-end ones. With this training, workers from factories that are expected to close down in the future will have a better chance of finding jobs in the new and evolving labour market.”

Minister Gatt said that the government will be conducting a “scoping study” wherein the requirements of the ICT industry will be examined in detail and the training given will attempt to be conformant to the study’s findings.

He said that all training will be completely free of charge and that although restricted to manufacturing sector employees, everyone in this sector may apply.