By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, November 20, 2015 : The blue-chip metal major, National Aluminium Company Limited (NALCO), on Thursday inked an MoU for skill development with National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and National Skill Development Fund (NSDF) as part of capacity development programme.

Nalco executive director, [corporate affairs], A.S. Ahluwalia, signed the MoU with NSDC and NSDF CEOs Jayant Krishna and Pawan Agarwal respectively in presence of Rohit Nandan, secretary, union ministry of skill development & entrepreneurship (MSDE) and T.K. Chand, Nalco chairman cum managing director, at New Delhi.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr Chand said that the MoU assumes great importance because it is the first such agreement in the mining sector of the country. “With this, we have committed 5% of our CSR budget for this capacity building programme and MSDE has evinced interest in developing a Centre of Excellence in NALCO,” he added.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched Skill India Mission during July this year, which envisages scaling up skill training efforts to meet the rising national demand and enhance employability of youths of the country. A meager 2.3% of the workforce in India has undergone formal skill training as compared to 52% in USA, 68% in UK, 75% in Germany, 80% in Japan and 96% in South Korea.