MINISTRY OF ECONOMY
AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
OF GEORGIA

Following the initiative of the Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development of Georgia, a meeting was held with the representatives of the Georgian textile industry at the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport, where the common sectoral challenges were discussed.

As Natia Turnava and Mikheil Chkhenkeli stated, promoting the businessmen during the problem-solving process is one of the main tasks of the Georgian government. It was said that the aforementioned gathering was scheduled at the meeting between Natia Turnava and the textile industry officials on October 18, during which the major sectoral challenges  were highlighted. Special attention was paid to the issue of training and qualifications of the staff.

Representatives of the textile companies talked about their needs and expressed their readiness to participate in the creation of an appropriate vocational program. It was mentioned that the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport is ready to finance vocational programs for training the qualified staff corresponding to the textile companies’ needs. The parties agreed on the details of the cooperation and planned the future workshops.

“Upon the instruction of the Prime Minister of Georgia, our Ministry periodically holds meetings with representatives of various industries. We have recently met with the textile industry officials from more than 20 companies and discussed the key challenges facing the field - one of the main issues was the lack of professional staff. This challenge is exactly the main task and challenge we are all working together on, since supporting the vocational education sector is one of the top priorities of our Ministry and our government,“ - the Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development, Natia Turnava, stated after the meeting.

“At the previous meeting, we promised the textile industry officials that the next meeting would be held at the Ministry that is hosting us today. We, from these two Ministries, are specifically discussing as to how to help these companies and support people - whether it be constructors, designers, technologists or other in-demand specialties - for training and retraining in such programs that will not pose a problem to the development of the textile industry; thus,  the willingness to employ people is already reflected in our textile industry,” - Natia Turnava stated.

According to the Minister, this is one of the directions for supporting the Georgian production.

“There are many other ways to support business - including the Enterprise Georgia’s program, as well as export business is also promoted in various international markets, however, our top priority is to retrain qualified staff in order to provide their proper employment inside the country and abroad” - the Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development declared.

Mikheil Chkhenkeli stressed that one of the priorities of the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport is to train qualified staff in the direction of vocational education, which will meet the market needs and will be employed quickly. In this regard, there must be a close cooperation between vocational colleges and private companies, including at the level of elaboration of professional programs.