A committee implementing the project until 2020 was told yesterday that nearly 1.2 million of the trained labourers were able to get new jobs or earned higher incomes at their existing places of employment.

Addressing the meeting, committee leader, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam, said all authorities should ensure that agricultural skills offered in training curricula were in line with agricultural development and restructuring.

Similarly, training for non-farm jobs should be based on local development plans for industry, services and handicrafts.

The Deputy PM said vocational courses should be organised only after the prospects for jobs and incomes for trainees were confirmed.

He requested the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs to work with ministries and sectors to finalise a draft decision to the Prime Minister on vocational training in general.

Dam added that priority must be given to those covered by State preferential policies, those living near or under the poverty line, ethnic people, people with disabilities, fishermen and those who had their farm land revoked for other uses.

Participants at the meeting agreed that the project’s targets in training and job placement had not been fulfilled and called for enterprises to become involved in creating jobs for rural workers.

In a separate development yesterday, Deputy PM Dam, head of the State Steering Committee on the search for the remains of fallen soldiers, attended a meeting to review progress.

It is estimated that there are about 1.2 million fallen soldiers nationwide