San Miguel Corp. (SMC), in collaboration with the Technical Education Skills and Development Authority (TESDA), is rolling out a skills training program allowing a number of Filipinos to exploit opportunities at its New Manila International Airport (NMIA) project and various other initiatives across the country.
“This is a great opportunity for many of our countrymen. The airport project and all our other projects, will not just generate jobs; more significantly, they will provide knowledge, skills, and technology transfer in construction, engineering, the operation of equipment and technologies, ground handling, aircraft maintenance, and many other fields.”
SMC president Ramon S. Ang
“This gives our people a chance to learn valuable and highly-specialized skills right here in our country, while earning a decent living, and helping our country’s growth and development. Later on, they can bring these skills with them for better opportunities abroad, or to continue working for us to operate and maintain our facilities,” he added.
Ang said SMC is working with over a hundred foreign experts in various fields at the airport project, redeveloping or turning what was once land converted into fishponds back into land form again.
Workers at the site are already learning from the foreign experts and may then be tapped to teach and pass on the skills and knowledge to the next batch of workers to be trained by TESDA and hired by SMC.
The SMC-TESDA partnership, which started in 2020, is now expanded to include Pangasinan, Laguna, and Palawan. Initially, the partnership covered residents of Bulacan, Bataan, Batangas, Quezon Province, General Santos City, South Cotabato, and Davao del Sur.
In most of the pilot areas, graduates of the SMC-TESDA program also benefit from housing assistance that allow families to build or buy new homes, or in the case of Sariaya, Quezon, resettle in an SMC-built free housing community.
The program, which began in Bulacan and extended to the different provinces, initially offered courses in heavy equipment operations, shielded metal arc welding, entrepreneurship training, electrical installation and maintenance, dressmaking, baking, and cookery.
“As we are expanding our businesses around the country, a fully-capable workforce is an essential ingredient to our success. We thank TESDA for their sincere support and tireless effort in helping us equip more Filipinos to improve their lives and help the country in the process,” Ang said.
The SMC-TESDA program also benefits displaced workers, returning overseas Filipino workers, senior citizens, persons with disabilities, and other qualified clients.
