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Ethiopian State Minister for TVET visited MSM

05-09-2019

From 26 until 30 August 2019 MSM welcomed the steering committee and deans of four TVET colleges in Ethiopia for a one week exposure visit. The visit is part of the three-year project “Bright Future in Agriculture”. The Ethiopian delegation was headed by Dr Abdiwasa Abdilahi, State Minister for TVET of the Ministry of Science & Higher Education.

The delegation of in total 15 people got acquainted with the Dutch Education system and experienced labor-market oriented agricultural tertiary education, with TVET School management and the gist of change management. The subgroup of high-level leaders had a 2 day separate program in The Hague where they visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Nuffic, Vocational Education Labour Market (SBB) and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. The aim was to learn from the Dutch education system, to seek strategic partnerships, and to share experiences on education policy.

At the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Minister was welcomed by the Director of the Africa Directorate, Mr Alle Dorhout. He and his team expressed the high priority for Ethiopia in the Dutch foreign policy related to Africa and indicated several options for further supporting the Ethiopian TVET sector.

In parallel of these high-level visits, the Ethiopian deans and private sector representatives was welcomed by Citaverde College a school who focusses on agricultural education in the Netherlands. At Citaverde the participants were introduced to a project called “Agro leeft”, which is a collaboration between green vocational education and business in the South-East Netherlands region. Blauwebessenland, Paprika farm Litjens, Gruntehofke, Dairy Farm Hoeve Rosa and lttb are all members of Agro Leeft and introduced the delegation to their business and way of working.

Furthermore the group also visited the dairy farm of Fam. Oskam, Huig van de Graaf which is a small local cheese factory and dairy farm Fam. Van de Vliert.

Bright Future in Agriculture
Bright Future in Agriculture (BFA) is a three-year project in support of the Ethiopian Agricultural Vocational Education sector. MSM and the Ethiopian Federal TVET Institute (FTI) implement the project together with 12 partners form the Netherlands, Ethiopia and South Africa. The project concentrates on the dairy and horticulture sub-sector, which both have huge economic opportunities. The Ethiopian government is building five agro-parks and has divided the country into six major corridors for horticulture. The agro processing parks are expected to create over 100,000 jobs and are very useful for sound links with agricultural TVETs: giving access to hands-on education and supplying qualified exposed graduates. BFA will strengthen the colleges to be able to serve the agro-industry.

Nuffic Orange Knowledge Programme
The Orange Knowledge Programme is a €195-m Dutch global development programme, available in 53 developing countries and managed by Nuffic, a Dutch non-profit organisation for internationalisation in education. Launched mid-2017, it aims to have provided tens of thousands with the possibility to change their future through education and training by mid-2022.

Stay up to date with all information concerning Bright Future in Agriculture via www.brightfutureinagriculture.net

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