THE Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) said it was able to train in 2022 a total of 28,982 returning overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) and their dependents.
Elated by their success, Tesda’s director-general Danilo P. Cruz reaffirmed his strong commitment to continue the agency’s efforts in upskilling and reskilling OFWs and their families since they have always been among its priority clients in the provision of skills training and livelihood programs.
“Those who come back after losing employment abroad are given the training to prepare them [with new skills for jobs] they will enter into; or if they will return to their foreign employment, and then decide to work here,” the Tesda chief said in a recent media interview.
Meanwhile OFWs and their dependents have also been enlisting to the Tesda Online Program (TOP), as 84,509 of them registered last year.
Among the top courses they have enrolled in are “Practicing Covid-19 Preventive Measures in the Workplace,” “Introduction to Caregiving,” and “Providing Housekeeping Services.”
The agency has likewise been helping displaced Filipino workers abroad under its “OFW Reintegration for Skills Employment (RISE)” program, which is being implemented with the help of the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration, Philippine Trade Training Center, and Coca-Cola Phils.
The OFW-RISE Program offers repatriates an online course accessible via the TOP, enabling them to transform their business ideas into feasible plans.
This year Cruz vowed to progressively improve Tesda’s programs so it could produce highly skilled and globally competitive workers who can adapt to the ever-changing demands of industries.
“We in Tesda have always strived to be more responsive to the needs of our kababayans,” he declared. “We make our services more accessible for the country’s work force [for them] to be suitably equipped for new jobs or livelihood ventures.”