NXPO President Dr. Kitipong Promwong recently presented a talk titled “NXPO: Building Future Skills” at Thailand Competitiveness Conference 2023: Building a Future-Proof Nation. The conference, organized by Thailand Management Association (TMA), took place on 16 November 2023 at Waldorf Astoria Bangkok.
Dr. Kitipong discussed the government’s efforts in leveraging higher education, science, research, and innovation in five key areas:
- Innovation-driven enterprises (IDEs): IDEs play a crucial role in fostering an innovation-based economy, contributing to a robust revenue stream. The goal is to increase the number of IDEs with an average revenue of THB 1 billion to 1,000 companies.
- High value-added industry: This involves promoting innovation in key industries to transition into higher-value products, such as future food in the food industry, autonomous electric vehicles in the automotive industry, or biopharmaceuticals in the bioindustry.
- Social mobility: This involves enhancing individuals’ socio-economic situations, contributing to the overall advancement of the country.
- Sustainability: Emphasis is placed on climate action, including the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, with a connection to international trade and investment. Thailand’s climate initiatives, such as the public-private partnership Saraburi Model for Low Carbon City and the Green University Campaign promoting a net-zero university, will be showcased at COP28 in Dubai, UAE.
- Workforce Reskilling/Upskilling: Upgrading workforce quality is essential as human resource is a critical success factor for the aforementioned four areas.
“The transition from a three-stage life to a multi-stage life has necessitated reskilling and upskilling programs, enabling professionals to acquire new skills to enhance their employment prospects. In support of Thailand’s target industries, NXPO conducted a survey on high-skilled workforce demands and developed the Future Skill Sets as a guide for universities to design courses and programs responsive to the demands of target industries,” Dr. Kitipong remarked.
Several initiatives have been introduced to support workforce development. These include the Higher Education Sandbox, which encourages novel educational programs such as an academia-industry co-creation program, a certification-module program, a credit bank program, and a high-tech entrepreneur program jointly established by the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce and Harbour.Space University of Spain.
In addition, NXPO, in collaboration with the Board of Investment (BOI), established STEMPlus – a platform supporting workforce development for the industry. The platform compiles a list of training courses and government tax incentives to promote STEM worker employment and workforce development. While these incentives have resulted in the training of more than 50,000 professionals in the past year, they are being expanded to provide rebates to SMEs and startups. Furthermore, NXPO, in partnership with Generation Thailand, introduced the GenNX Model – an initiative to provide fast, intensive training in the form of bootcamps to launch high-demand careers such as software developers and senior care professionals.
