India & UK Signed MOU to Enhance the Collaboration within the framework of UKIERI

Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) and Ministry of Labour and Employment (MoLE) on 16 January 2014 signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to enhance the collaboration within the framework of UK India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI) in New Delhi.

The signing was done after a bilateral meeting between the delegations led by K Suresh, the Minister of State of Labour and Employment (MoLE) of Government of India and Matthew Hancock, the Minister of State for Skills and Enterprise of United Kingdom.

The MoU focuses to collaborate and build partnership in the area of Skill Development and Employment Services. Following activities will be supported as per the guiding document for overall collaboration
• Institutional capacity building of UK and Indian official and institutes handling skill development and employment services
• Sharing of technical expertise, building linkages and identification of gaps in the areas of skill development and employment services, improvement in curriculum, benchmarking of assessment, certification and training methods.
• Supporting development of employment services in India on the lines of National Careers Service, UK.
• Other   beneficial projects, in the area of skill development and employment services, mutually agreed.

UKIERI as its first step will facilitate the partnership of the stakeholders of India with the existing Career Services in the UK. It will also share the best practices of UK to help development of Indian model with the Ministry of Labour and Employment and other stakeholders. The initiative of both the countries will be funded jointly by MoLE and UKIERI and the expenses of India will be borne by MoLE and UK cost by UKIERI.

The two countries will also partner on Mentor Councils (MCs) in identified priority sectors, which will be the response to the demand of skills in the sector. It includes restructuring of courses, curriculum development, identification and development of good teaching and learning aids, training of trainers with quality, devising assessment mechanisms, improving on the job training and others.
 
The support of UKIERI will be provided by UK experts for Mentor Councils for up to 10 sectors through institutional partnership between the MCs set up by MoLE and the National Skill Academies in the UK. The funding of this programme will also be in the same pattern of jointly funding in respective countries.