An Education Needs Assessment of CARIFORUM Firms

blue and green economies (with a heavy focus on renewable energy), medicinal cannabis, and life

sciences. Secondly, even within traditional sectors, modernization and diversification drives are

seeing new product and service offerings being developed. For example, greater emphasis is being

placed on community-based tourism models and innovative agri-food systems that actively

leverage digital technologies.

Noteworthy is the growing role that the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are playing in

anchoring regional and national development trajectories. Beyond SDG 4 (Quality Education),

which directly speaks to skills from an education perspective, this goal has several links to other

SDG areas. Some of the most emphasized connections of SDG 4 across literature focus on linkages

with SDGs 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) and 5 (Gender), and to a lesser extent with

others like SDGs 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), 7 (Affordable and Clean Energy), 11

(Sustainable Cities and Communities), 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) and 13

(Climate Action) (Vladimirovaa and Le Blancb 2015).

1 .2.2. Skills Gaps Among CARIFORUM’s Private Sector & Wider Labo ur Market

According to the Future of World and Skills Survey 2021, many businesses in the Caribbean

cannot use workforce analytics to predict and monitor skills gaps and identify future skills needs

(PWC 2021a). There is a lack of up-to-date skills and education needs assessments at the regional

and national levels. Perhaps the most recent comprehensive attempt wa s Compete Caribbean’s

Regional Private Sector Assessment Report in 2015 and the associated National Private Sector

Assessment Reports published in 2014. Despite not being dedicated, skills assessments made

relevant mention of the private sector’s skills needs at the time (Compete Caribbean 20 15). This

section builds on these reports, leveraging insights from recent sources, including national labour

market/skills assessments where available and priority training areas highlighted under national

development scholarship programmes in Annex 3, to identify cross-cutting skills gaps and more

sector-specific skills gaps.

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