>> iMOVE at "Education India"

iMOVE took part in the international training fair “Education India 2003”, April 3-5 in New Delhi.

What opportunities are there for German providers of continuing vocational training held in the Indian “training market”? It was with this question in mind that iMOVE went to the well-attended “Education India 2003”. While there are now more than 2000 students from India enrolled in Germany and German universities and colleges are able to look back over several decades of excellent cooperation with Indian partners, issues relating to initial and continuing vocational education and training have thus played an appreciable role only in the area of government-financed development work with India.

In the wake of a fundamental about-face in the direction of Indian economic policy over the last 12 months in the direction of liberalisation and the opening of its market, Indian business management has increasingly realised that international competitiveness is also to a large degree dependant on the vocational qualification of its workforce. The vocational training system, which is primarily run by the Indian state is far from being up to the challenges posed by rapidly modernising business and industry. Hence, business is increasingly looking for new concepts and sources of modern, practice-oriented continuing training strategies and training content. At the same time India is also focusing on Germany, because after all vocational training “made in Germany” continues to enjoy a good reputation in India.

The fact that a potentially viable continuing vocational training market has formed in India was underscored in a series of additional meetings such as, e.g. with the Confederation of Indian Industry, a leading economic peak association. These meetings were prepared and carried out with the support of EDUCON.

After her trip to New Dehli, it is evident to Sabine Gummersbach-Majoroh, head of the iMOVE office at BIBB, that India is an interesting market for continuing training and for this reason on the agenda of coming activities. This country offers major potential and challenges to German training providers.

The latitude for activities along these lines is great: the scale of opportunities ranges from brief seminars for specialists and managers in the area of business administration all the way to company-related long-term training in technical professions.

For additional information on Education India 2003 see the website www.educationindia-online.com/ei/

Have a look at the iMOVE ad in the trade fair catalogue of Education India.