Amb. Peter Lan and Hon. Minister Camillo Gonsalves co-hosted the Orientation Session of the ON-SITE programme at the Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Community College (SVGCC) on 6th March, 2023.
Mr. Nigel Scott, Director of SVGCC, Mr. Recardo Frederick, Director of Economic Planning, colleagues from the Embassy and Technical Mission of the Republic of China (Taiwan), officials from the Ministry of Finance, participating youths and media also attended the function.
Amb. Lan congratulated the 189 participants for being selected to the ON-SITE programme from more than 600 applicants. He said the diplomatic ties between Taiwan and SVG had lasted for almost 42 years, and the relation had always been firm and cooperative. He felt honoured to work with the SVG government in promoting the ON-SITE programme, not only for benefits to the employment rate and economic growth of the country, but more importantly, the experiences of internship would help the participants to start their careers. He encouraged the participants to equip themselves with knowledge and skills during the 6-month internship, and to impress the enterprises so that they must hire the participants after finishing the internship.
In his remarks, Hon. Minister Gonsalves elaborated the support from Taiwan to national developments of SVG, such as loans for the construction of the new Kingstown Port, the hotel in Mt. Wynne, roads and bridges across the country, as well as funding the Supportive Education and Training Programme (SET) and the Youth Employment Service Programme (YES). When he proposed the idea of ON-SITE programme one year earlier, Amb. Lan responded promptly and promised full support. For that he expressed sincere appreciation for the continuous support from the government and people of Taiwan. He also urged the participants to work hard to turn the internship into a permanent employment.(E)
