An International Organisation, DVV, has stated that adult education through vocational training helps people to be more self-sufficient.
In an interview with ProjectM on Saturday, Communication Officer Dyson Nthawanji, said the participants are benefiting through vocational training because they acquire much-needed skills.
He added that people are dedicating themselves, starting from entire communities to chiefs who are in the forefront in supporting the project because they are the ones who provide the infrastructure for learning centres.
Nthawanji also said that after graduating they are able to stand on their own and buy tailoring machines for business purposes.
He said: “As we implement the project, we do not select an infrastructure but it is the communities especially chiefs who volunteer by providing infrastructure including members of the committee which oversees the activities of these classes. So, there is commitment and dedication among the people and this is what has brought progress in all the projects that Community Learning Centres integrated adult education and other interventions.
“For your own information, soon after tailoring training they are also given entrepreneurship skills to conduct tailoring as a viable business, so that they should make profits and be able to market the products which they make.”
Furthermore, Nthawanji said that these vocational training skills are in line with Malawi Vision 2063 because these programmes target communities and they want to see that our country will be better than before.
“So, by acquiring vocational skills, it will help those people who were just idle in the communities to start engaging in income activities. So if they engage in income activities, they will be able to raise money to support their family and community, as a result, many communities will be developed and this will be a great contribution from community initiatives to Malawi’s Vision 2063, which is a development blueprint for the Country,” he explained.
In his remarks, education expert Dr. Limbani Nsapato said that adult education is really critical because it is part of human capital development and it ensures that relevant skills are imparted on people, especially communities in rural areas.
He added that remote area communities have a lot of challenges such as poverty, diseases and other issues that need to be addressed by interventions like literacy programs.
DVV International supports adult literacy and vocational training as one way of promoting quality education, human capital development and contributing to Malawi Vision 2063.
“As you know that in Malawi Vision 2063, human capital development is imparting the skills for development so the training that have been done under the adult literacy and education programs as well as vocational training, they help to give the capacity of the enhancing the capital development in Malawi Vision 2063,” said Nsapato.
DVV International has Community Learning Centres in Dowa and Ntchisi and tailoring training in Zomba Central Prison.
