In announcing his Senate reelection bid, Villanueva says trained labor force in ‘new normal’ a make-or-break for recovery
The country’s “agility to pivot to the post-pandemic economy” will depend largely on how it can train a labor force that could meet the demands of the “new world of work,” Senator Joel “Tesdaman” Villanueva said as he announced his reelection bid.
Speaking at the launch of the Tulong Trabaho Scholarship Program, Villanueva told over 500 scholars that retooling and upskilling are the ways to go to become employable as the country recovers from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic
“There is no going back to the way things were before the pandemic,” said Villanueva, chairman of the Senate labor committee. “Our economy is undergoing retooling that requires workers who have been reskilled.”
“Trabaho ang lagi nating trabaho. Ito po ang misyon natin noon, ngayon, at sa hinaharap,” continued Villanueva, who earned the moniker “Tesdaman” as he successfully steered the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) from 2010 to 2015 as director general.
“Sa ngalan po ng pangarap ng mga kabataang pilipino, ipagpapatuloy po natin ang misyon ni Tesdaman sa Senado para sa Trabaho, Edukasyon, Serbisyo, Dignidad at Asenso ng bawat Pilipino,” Villanueva said, specifying his vision of creating and sustaining jobs.
Fortunately, the country had success in training manpower en masse “when 20 million workers were trained by TESDA during the past decade.”
He called on the government “to tap the TESDA way” in preparing the workforce that a changed economy requires.
"Sa ngalan po ng pangarap ng mga kabataang pilipino, ipagpapatuloy po natin ang misyon ni Tesdaman sa Senado para sa Trabaho, Edukasyon, Serbisyo, Dignidad at Asenso ng bawat Pilipino.”
“Hindi po ba sa gera, naghahanda tayo sa pamamagitan ng pagsasanay ng mga sundalo? Ganun din ang gawin natin ngayon. I-train ang mga manggagawa para sa mga trabahong magbabangon sa ating ekonomiya,” he said.
He challenged presidential candidates “to install technical-vocational education as a major plank in their platform.”
He said the presence of a large trained tech-voc pool will enable the “country to hit the ground running in getting the country back on its feet.”
Villanueva keynoted the event, organized by the National Capital Region office of TESDA, where some 500 individuals composed of displaced workers, OFW returnees, out-of-school youths, and employed individuals stand to benefit from the Tulong Trabaho Scholarship Program, formed under Republic Act No. 11230.
Villanueva, principal author and sponsor of RA No. 11230 or the Tulong Trabaho law, explained that the law seeks to strengthen the qualifications of Filipino workers to meet the challenges of the rapidly evolving workplaces.
The law, which was enacted in 2018, addresses the job-skills mismatch prevalent in the labor market by linking the requirements of industry to primarily address unemployment.
The Tulong Trabaho Scholarship Program, which is expected to benefit some 40,000 individuals, received P1 billion under the 2021 national budget. It is part of the government’s National Employment Recovery Strategy, which seeks to breathe life back into the sputtering economy.