Malaysia still in need of non-destructive testing experts

KUANTAN: Malaysia still faces a shortage of experts in nondestructive testing ( NDT) which is among essential technology in the engineering world.

The Senior Director of the Commercialisation and Technology Planning programme of the Malaysia Nuclear Agency ( MNA), Datuk Dr Zulkifli Mohamed Hashim said the field of NDT was rather expansive and the opportunity to control it should be seized as it contributed to economic improvement, competitiveness and national development.

“The field of NDT involves the use of conventional methods and has developed into an advanced NDT where each has its strengths and weaknesses that complement each other.

“To date, Malaysia has only 18 local NDT specialists, but not advanced NDT specialists yet. As we are still behind compared to developed countries, efforts are underway to generate more NDT specialists between the next three and five years to come,” he said in a press conference after the opening ceremony for a special seminar on advanced NDT technology here yesterday.

The inaugural seminar was held as a platform to enable local and foreign NDT specialists to discuss technological development in NDT. Zulkifli said among the main initiatives taken were to provide comprehensive training and prepare a teaching workforce for the certification of the field.

“Efforts are underway to create a National Occupation Standards for NDT. Once it is certified by the Skills Development Department under the Human Resources Ministry, we will offer NDT training programmes,” he said. — Bernama