Hairdressing training a cut above for Lao youth

The Lao-Korea Skills Development Institute under the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare has opened a training course for budding young hairdressers as a pathway out of poverty.
The training initiative aims to strengthen the skills of hair stylists to help supply the market and create jobs for unemployed young people. Participants can improve their proficiency in hair cutting and styling while practising on wigs.
Speaking at the course opening ceremony on Friday, Director General of the Institute, Dr Bounma Sitthisom said the training was equipping people from poor backgrounds with vocational skills and at the same time boosting the SME sector.
“They can use the knowledge they gain from the training for personal development and to help lift their families out of poverty,” he said.
“So far the institute has been successful in raising vocational standards in the industrial, automobile, information and communications technology, and the tourism and hospitality sectors, which includes hairdressing,” he added.
The training is part of efforts to build National Skills Labour Standards in vocational fields including hairdressing, with all institutes under the ministry employing these standards to develop study curriculums which the labour sector has been upgrading.
Employers increasingly need skilled workers, but these cannot be supplied in sufficient quantities, according to the ministry.
The ministry has set a target to produce 658,000 skilled labourers by 2020 to meet the needs of the market.
The ministry will continue concentrating on capacity building for Lao labour to supply market demand.

By Phetphoxay Sengpaseuth
(Latest Update August 28, 2019)