The Ministry of Tourism is on track to provide training for some 8,000 tourism workers by 2024 as part of its human development strategy.
"I am proud to announce that we are on target to train 8,000 tourism workers over the next five years," Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett disclosed.
"We are doing this level of human capital development to influence the labour market arrangements within the sector by professionalizing the sector and creating a cadre of workers that are qualified, certified and can be classified."
Speaking during his contribution to the annual Sectoral Debate in the House last Tuesday, Bartlett reiterated that the Ministry of Tourism will be working closely with the Ministry of Labour to bring an end to short term contractual arrangements.
This, he argued, will be pivoted by "professionalising the sector and creating a cadre of workers that are qualified, certified and can be classified".
Noting that "we run the gamut from high school, through tourism sector workers and now into the realm of graduate studies", the tourism minister revealed that the two-year Hospitality and Tourism Management Programme, which was launched last year, is currently in 33 high schools with a cohort of 350 students.
The cohort will increase to 650 students by 2020, Bartlett disclosed.
The HTMP is a unique certification programme for high schools offered by the American Hotel and Lodging Educational Institute (AHLEI), which will allow students to gain entry-level qualifications in tourism as well as Associate Degrees in Customer Service and is recognized by the Jamaica Customer Service Association (JaCSA).
It falls under the umbrella of the Jamaica Centre of Tourism Innovation (JCTI), which was launched in 2017 as a pathway to professional certification in the sector. The mandate of the JCTI is to identify competent workers in the industry who are not certified and also graduates from tertiary institutions who have theoretical knowledge but no practical experience.
Bartlett also pointed out that the University of the West Indies (UWI) should have its first-ever Graduate School of Tourism established at its Western Jamaica Campus by 2020.
