The AFOS Foundation is promoting skilled and confident employees, bridging the gap between knowledge, performance and the needed skills to improve productivity and performance in the poultry industry through a custom-made dual Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) programme directed at technicians and lower management staff (shop floor management level) of participating Agro-allied companies in order to develop a qualified and certified workforce in the poultry industry. The programme focuses on providing National Skills Qualification (NSQ) to this category of poultry industry workforce in three professional occupations: Poultry Production, Poultry Mechanics, and Quality Technician. The AFOS TVET programme is part of the Foundation’s interventions delivered through the AFOS INGO AGRAR Phase II project which runs from March 2021 – December 2024.
During Phase 1, the project encountered a very large group of workforces in the poultry sector classified as casual labours, possessing little or no educational qualification that would enable them to work as skilled labour, hence they were not recognized as skilled staff and are less paid although they are the frontline workers in production within the poultry industry. Thus, the TVET initiative aims to enable this workforce to upscale their skills and knowledge to keep their jobs and attain competency certifications for what they do. The goal is to provide a capacity building that certifies these frontline staff, position them for possible upgrade to full-time employment in their respective organizations and enable them to have access to the benefits available to full employees to earn a better living During Phase 2, the focus is to institutionalize the AFOS TVET program, aligning it with the National Skills Qualification Framework in Nigeria (NSQF), such that the TVET certification is adopted across the Nigerian poultry industry gaining both national and international recognition.
This project outcome is right now focusing on meeting the following requirements for delivering nationally recognized TVET certifications:
- Establishment of the Agricultural Training Centre (ATC), to operate as the qualified TVET/NSQ Training Centre.
- Develop within the ATC, a team of Assessors pulled from AFOS’ Agric industry partners to provide training, mentorship, guidance, and assessment of the NSQ trainees undergoing TVET qualification to support the trainees in developing job competencies.
- Qualify a team of Internal Quality Assurance Managers (IQAM) responsible for monitoring the assessment decisions of the Assessors, ensuring standardization of assessment within the Centre, and providing advice and support to Assessors and candidates as and when required.
- Development of a National Occupational Standards (NOS) on each of the trades – Poultry production, Poultry mechanic, and Quality technician.
- Registration of the Agricultural Training Centre (which is now being established as the agricultural training unit of the Microfinance Agricultural Learning and Development Centre), with the TVET awarding body – NBTE Centre of Excellence for TVET and Delegation of German Industry & Commerce (DIGIC-AHK).
- Fulfilling the need for a Sectors’ Skills Council.
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