National ICT skills contest

"With the rapid growth of the ICT industry, the market demand for highly skilled ICT workers has continuously increased over the last few years, especially in the areas of telecoms, computing and networking. This is because infrastructure and networking is beginning to play a more important role in the development of the country," said Nakorn Silapa-acha, director-general of the Labour Ministry's Skill Development Department.

The department, the Foundation of Scientific and Technology Council of Thailand and Cisco Thailand have jointly launched a national competition, which is open to ICT professionals across the country. Selected Thai professionals will represent the Kingdom in the 40th WorldSkills Competition, held every two years and in which 50 member countries meet and compete in various vocational skills.

Representatives from Thailand took part in WorldSkills 2007, with one professional in each of 17 categories. The Thai team won four silver medals and seven medallions of excellence.

This year's international competition will take place in Canada in September. Thai representatives will compete in the Telecommunication Distribution Technology and IT/PC Network Supporting areas.

Cisco Thailand has organised the national competition for the past three years and has trained more than 20,000 networking professionals.

Managing director Tatchapol Poshyanonoda said the national contest would enable the best Thai youths to go on to demonstrate their capabilities on the biggest stage of all. The competition is an important step towards enabling Thai students to show their competitiveness at the global level.

Moreover, it will promote the development of qualified human resources for the market and raise awareness to the importance of skilled professionals in the networking area, said Tatchapol.