Apprenticeship framework must provide flexibility in work hours: Eco Survey

Such reform and better compensation will improve employability of vocational students, it says

India’s apprenticeship framework must be reformed for work-hour flexibility and better compensation, said the Economic Survey on Monday, arguing doing so will improve skills of the workforce and employability of vocational students.

“The regulatory framework needs to be mindful of the cost benefit ratio of hiring apprentices for local firms. As it stands, apprentices’ productivity and working hours may vary and flexibility in the contract terms could enable mutually beneficial arrangements rather than closing doors for any engagement,” the survey said.

The role of government agencies in the apprenticeship framework must be minimised in order to ease the compliance requirements of establishments.

“Establishing a mechanism to convert the skills acquired at apprenticeships into gainful employment by networking between registered establishments and industry clusters, forward linkages with entrepreneurship schemes etc. would also be useful. Operationalising the matching of opportunities and demand at local levels such as a district or satellite areas of cities, etc would improve outcomes where students work as apprentices on weekends on mutually agreeable terms,” the survey said.

Lack of coordination between education institutions and industry, inadequate infrastructure, gaps in regulations and the perception that vocational training is inferior to academic education are challenges in the apprenticeship framework.

The national apprenticeship promotion scheme set a target of enrolling 4.6 million apprentices in the four years from 2022-23 to 2025- 26, whereas the enrolments from 2016-17 to 2021-22 were 1.6 million. The outcome signals scope for improvement in such schemes.

“The technological intervention of having a unified portal and moving payments to the direct benefit transfer system may have helped increase enrolments from 290,000 in FY21 to 580,000 in FY22 but few systemic weaknesses need to be addressed if the target is to be achieved. Of more concern is that less than 50 percent of apprentices engaged have completed training. There is a lack of information on the final outcome of gainful employment for the trainees,” it noted.