A Renewable Energy Sector Skills Council is coming soon.
This is according to Minister of Labour, Social Security and Third Sector, Colin Jordan, who made the announcement recently, while delivering remarks at the closing ceremony of the National Symposium on Just Transition and Job Creation in the Green and Blue Economy, held at Hilton Barbados, Needhams Point, St Michael.
Reiterating Government’s commitment to making the outcomes of the symposium a reality, the Minister professed:
“We will be in our own Ministry, working on the activation of a National Skills Council, a Renewable Energy Sector Skills Council. Skills councils are used all over the world as a mechanism to bring the public, well all the sectors together, public, private and third sector, so that we can work collaboratively in order to make sure that as a country, we are positioned to take advantage of the opportunities that lie ahead of us. And so, we’ve engaged many of our stakeholders.”
Jordan also disclosed that the next step would be to take to Cabinet the paper that will give his Ministry official approval to set up the Renewable Energy Sector Skills Council.
Noting when this is done, the work would be started, the Minister contended:
“All that we do is tripartite; the Social Partners are here; the Social Partners will be integral to that Skills Council, and we will use that as one of the tangible next steps to make real this Just Transition that we’ve spent so much time talking about.”
Local, regional, and international partners further heard that the Labour Ministry would be placing emphasis on the necessary research and analysis to ensure there is progress, in terms of the next steps.
Jordan also acknowledged the contributions of the Inter-American Development Bank, the CARICOM Secretariat, the UNDP, the United Nations Environmental Program and the Governments of Trinidad and Tobago, Antigua and Barbuda, and Mauritius.
He added:
“That approach, that amalgam of stakeholders says to us very clearly that even at the local level, we are addressing a global challenge.”
SOURCE: Barbados Government Information Service (GIS).
