Bhutan has for many years tried to reform vocational training and encourage young people to apply for these instead of aiming for desk jobs, preferably in administration, more prestigious. The lack of professionals and craftsmen, especially in the construction industry, has been solved by importing guest workers, mainly from India.
The pandemic led to many young people in, for example, the tourism industry losing their jobs. The ”Build Bhutan” project would be attractive, but for this, master trainers were needed, preferably from Europe, to train local vocational teachers in a large and varied number of professions and sectors. This project was replaced the year before by ”Skills Development”, with a similar structure. The friendship societies were asked to help find highly qualified candidates to spend 3-12 months in Bhutan.
The chairman contacted dozens of organizations, networks and people, but without success – the terms were not very realistic or attractive for Swedes, unless you were retired.
Finally, an excellent candidate was found, Lars Olsson, welding teacher with long international and Swedish experience in welding training and certification at all levels, who was invited and spent three months last summer at the vocational schools in Punakha and Gelephu training and certifying Bhutanese welding teachers.
Lars Olsson and the new welding teachers with their certificates
Lars Olsson thanked by the minister of labour and human resources Karma Dorji