Penang drawing up loan, internship scheme in bid to keep talent

GEORGE TOWN, Aug 4 — Penang is developing a programme to offer study loans, scholarships, and internships to tertiary students in an attempt to retain the state’s human capital and power its knowledge-based industry..

The programme will be a joint effort by InvestPenang and Penang Career Assistance and Talent (CAT), which are now in discussions with multinational corporations (MNC) to secure funding for the scheme.

“We want to get students from the beginning so we will interview the students to see if they qualify for the study loans or scholarship so that they could continue their studies in the institutes of higher education of their choice,” said InvestPenang director Datuk Lee Kah Choon.

Once the students completed their studies, they will be offered placements as interns at the MNC sponsoring their education.

“This is so that the students get financial assistance to study and after that, a chance to train in an international company environment,” he said.

It is one of the state’s efforts to train up knowledge workers and retain local talent, as the students may get the option to continue working at the MNC after their internship ends.

Lee said they are aiming to finalise the plan in six months to help Penang address its need for more knowledge workers.

The special advisor to the Penang chief minister said the new scheme will complement an existing  international internship programme in collaboration with universities in Japan, New Zealand, Germany and Switzerland.

“In this programme, international students from these countries will come here to intern at MNCs and the first batch of students from Japan will come at the end of this month,” Lee said.

Students from New Zealand will also be arriving later this month.

“This is a multi-prong arrangement between InvestPenang and Penang CAT Centre to work with the business community to match these students to the factories where they can intern and work here,” he said.

Lee said Penang currently has the lowest unemployment rate in the country at only 1.7 per cent versus 3.1 per cent for the rest of the country..

He noted that as at July 31 this year, a popular job portal showed there are 2,635 executive positions being offered in Penang.

“In JobsMalaysia, it showed there are 11,759 vacancies in Penang as at July 31 but 41 per cent is for production operators,” Lee said.

Lee also said a number of existing investors in Penang have up to 1,600 vacancies for technicians, engineers and executive level workers.

“There is an urgent need for Malaysian universities and skills training centres to produce talents to meet the demands of global investors in order to attract more investors,” he said.