VietNamNet Bridge – Thousands of university graduates in the country’s northwestern provinces are unable to find work and are having to go to vocational colleges to study marketable skills.

Thousands of university graduates in the country’s northwestern provinces are unable to find work and are having to go to vocational colleges to study marketable skills. — Photo cand.com.vn

Nguyen Tai Thu, 28, of Khanh Trung Commune in Lao Cai Province’s Van Ban District told the Voice of Viet Nam online newspaper that he could not find a job after graduating from a university in Ha Noi and had no choice but to take a training course in electricity, he said.

Nguyen Van Ha, head of the Lao Cai vocational training college, said the local labour market needs vocational training graduates, not university graduates.

Some 63,000 students from vocational training colleges in the province - 97 per cent of the graduates - found jobs between 2011 and 2015, Hà  said. Meanwhile 6,000 university and college graduates were unemployed, he said.

The situation in Yen Bai, a northern mountainous province, is no different, with thousands of students jobless.

Le Trong Khang, vice chairman of the People’s Committee of Mu Cang Chai District, said that nearly 200 graduates in his area could not find jobs.

He said the committee was trying to work with a garment factory and hydropower plant to employ them, and suggested they could also work in local co-operatives which specialise in services, tourism, agriculture or livestock development.

Many of the job seekers have turned back to agricultural cultivation.

Hoang Duc Minh, deputy director of the Education and Training Department in the northern province of Lai Chau, said the department did not have official statistics on the number of unemployed students after graduation.

But to address the problem the department has nonetheless directed high schools to focus on profession-oriented training.

The extent of the unemployment among university graduates should serve as a warning to the current training programme of universities and colleges, experts said.

Forecasting labour market demand and an awareness of the required professional orientation for students in high schools needed to be improved, they added.

VNS