The title of the headline story of the Wednesday, November 8, 2023 edition of the business section of the Jamaica Observer shouted: ‘Open That Door — Private sector bosses beg for migrant labour as pressure increases to fill job openings in Jamaica’.

Seprod Group of Companies CEO Richard Pandohie accurately captured not only the problem but gave insight to its nature. According to the article, he says, “At the lowest end, you tend to have labour availability, but as you go up the value chain…there is a shortage in Jamaica and the situation is continuing to get worse.”

Fellow manufacturer from the Wisynco Group, Andrew Mahfood, was also interviewed and he said, “I think one of the things we need to look on as a country, as businesses expand in all areas…we need more talent to work in those industries, and if it is not available locally… we need to look within and outside the region to source talent…otherwise you will see businesses starting to stall.”

Their concern comes amidst a report published by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (Statin) Director General Carol Coy coming out of the July 2023 Labour Force Survey. The key finding is that the country’s unemployment rate fell to 4.5 per cent, which is 2.1 per cent below where it was in July 2022.

Jamaica’s workforce problem goes deeper than a shortage of labour. Even if every vacancy were filled today, there would still be the problem of low labour productivity. Writing in The Gleaner, April 9, 2018 edition, under the title ‘Productivity improvement necessary for growth’, the late and at that time chief executive officer of the Jamaica Productivity Centre, Dr Charles Douglas, had this to say, “Examining the labour productivity performance of the Jamaican economy, the data reveals that from 1951 to 1975 labour productivity growth averaged an impressive 5.3 per cent annually. In contrast, for the next 42 years (1976 to 2017), average labour productivity growth was negative 0.61 per cent annually.”

Paradoxically, the November 8, 2023 Business Observer also carried a picture of Prime Minister Andrew Holness on tour of Pepsi Cola’s new multimillion-dollar production line, which is intended to significantly boost production and productivity at that facility. Alas, in Jamaica there is the spectre of workers with qualifications that are more suited to the 18th century at the start of the Industrial Revolution occupying jobs in this 21st-century high technology environment — the very antithesis to development.

The situation begs the question, whither the HEART/NSTA Trust? The agency was established in 1982 by then Prime Minister Edward Seaga and enjoys 3 per cent deducted from the nation’s payrolls at source to, as its vision statement proclaims, develop a globally competitive workforce, impacting nation-building through human capital development. The concern extends to the Vocational Development Training Institute (VDTI), whose establishment in 1970 predated that of HEART, which since 1990 assumed responsibility for its management.

In a conversation with Pandohie, he expressed a dream for his company’s workforce, which in the context of the existing labour market dilemma seems far-fetched. It is that the individual employed to be a production line worker today in a few years would be knocking at the door to fill a vacancy for production superintendent. The type of worker Pandohie dreams of is not prevalent among job seekers for factory jobs. The fact is measured against the soft and technical skills required by the 21st-century worker, and many of Jamaica’s education and training institutions are producing dinosaurs, even before they graduate.

A real-life example will serve to demonstrate the gap between where Jamaica is and where it needs to get to. A manager with global experience, upon arrival to fill an executive post with a Jamaican conglomerate announced that a major aspect of the improvement plan going forward would be to engender a performance culture. This would involve not only procurement and commissioning of state-of-the-art technology, but there would be a shift to the use of metrics to track and measure performance against targets. These changes were to be implemented in an area of the operation in which the skill set is mostly of the labourer type. Staring us in the face are 21st-century workforce demands for which we are unprepared.

Newly appointed managing director of the HEART/NSTA Trust, Dr Taneisha Ingleton, in a November 27, 2023 Observer article titled ‘HEART/NSTA Trust partnering with trade unions’ said, “I don’t know if there is any university that puts out that much in any given year [referring to the Trust’s plan to matriculate over 11,000 graduates from across the island over the months of November and December]. So what we are doing at the HEART Trust is really equipping the Jamaican industry with skilled labour.”

There is no gainsaying the valuable contribution of HEART and VDTI. One suspects, however, that the concept of vocational education within which they had their genesis is out of sync with today’s need for globally certified workers who are educated to at least the associate degree level — so-called knowledge workers.

Taking a fresh look and realigning with current industry needs in a growing economy is both urgent and important.

Dr Henley Morgan is founder and executive chairman of the Trench Town-based Social Enterprise, Agency for Inner-city Renewal and author of My Trench Town Journey — Lessons in Social Entrepreneurship and Community Transformation for Policy Makers, Development Leaders, and Practitioners. Send comments to the Jamaica Observer or hmorgan@cwjamaica.com