The National - News

Finding a skilled workforce involves specific training in the abilities needed

-

Kunwer Sachdev, the managing director of Su-Kam, an Indian company which manufactur­es solar technology, talks about the challenges when it comes to finding skilled employees for the renewables industry.

Q

Is India trying to train workers for the renewable energy sector? A

The government of India has launched the Skill India mission, which aims to train over 400 million people in India in different skills by 2022. Various schemes have been launched to further the aim of skill developmen­t. The objective is to enable a large number of Indian youth to take up industry-relevant skill training that will help them in securing a better livelihood. India’s economy is growing and renewable energy is going to be a big contributo­r to it.

To what extent are these schemes successful?

The intent of our prime minister Narendra Modi and the government is very good behind all these initiative­s, but the bureaucrat­ic set-up of the government hinders the interactio­n between the industry and the skilling institutio­ns. Due to this there is a huge gap in the available and the required skill pool. According to the Internatio­nal Renewable Energy Agency, employment opportunit­ies in India’s renewable energy sector will almost double by 2022. The report also noted that renewable energy employment continues to shift towards Asian countries.

How could this be improved?

The coursework should be industry-focused and the percentage of practical trainings should be more than just theoretica­l work.

How do you manage the situation of this lack of human resources? As an organisati­on, we skill and train our people regularly. We have

worked in skilling many people that are part of the existing solar industry. Training needs to be continuous and upgraded from time to time.

What are the other challenges you face in the solar industry?

The training costs are high, since the attrition rate for skilled people is high – because the demand is much more than the existing number of skilled workers. Companies do not have enough trained manpower that understand­s the needs of the customer and the technology of the sector, and this may lead to providing solutions that may not be right.

What is the potential of the renewable energy sector in India? India has huge potential for the renewable energy sector. We are working hard on developing solar products and technologi­es suitable, viable and workable for conditions that are uniquely Indian or for all developing and underdevel­oped countries. We need to understand that Europe has made huge progress in the field, but their products are not suitable for our country due to various reasons like storage solutions, power voltage and frequency fluctuatio­ns. This range is very wide and different in rural and urban conditions and power availabili­ty.

Rebecca Bundhun

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Arab Emirates