IN a bid to address Fiji’s labour shortage crisis, the Coalition Government plans to top up apprentices pay and allow sponsored students to work 20 hours a week, says Employment Minister Agni Deo Singh.
He said this in Parliament on Monday in response to a question from Opposition Member Alvick Maharaj on whether the ministry had undertaken a study to ascertain which industries or sectors were affected the most and what was the State doing about it.
“The hourly pay of the apprentices is $2.97. We are now offering the employers an incentive to top it up with $2, to make it $4.97 or pay 50 percent of the school fee through TSLS. That is the incentive we are working on,” Mr Singh said.
“As I speak, the Fiji Commerce and Employers Federation together with our ministry with the assistance from the ILO (International Labour Organisation) is conducting its own survey of the job market including
that of the SMEs and that is going to assist us further in determining the areas of need where we can then offer the short-term and medium term training programmes through all the institutions that are
offering this programme.”
Mr Singh said the Tertiary Scholarship and Loans Service has allowed over 13,000 sponsored students to work 20 hours a week by seeking approval.
“This is helping employers to some extent mitigate labour shortages. I thank the TSLS, again, for this initiative in helping the Government and the employers.”
