The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and Japan will establish a training center for operators of construction equipment in Luwero, Uganda.
Exchange of Notes, enacting the financial support of the Government of Japan as well as the technical support from Japanese partner Komatsu Ltd to the UNIDO project, was signed last week by Japan’s Ambassador to Uganda, Kazuaki Kameda, and UNIDO Country Representative for Uganda Bruno Otto Tokwiny.
In recent years, the Government of Uganda has procured road construction and maintenance equipment that were distributed to local district governments across the country; and the new training center will allow to match the investment in road machinery with an equivalent investment in human resources.
Within the next three years, the training center will train at least 50 instructors, 360 local district government operators, and over 80 young Ugandans seeking employment.
The training center will include Japanese expertise requested to establish a new training curriculum for road construction management and methods – in close collaboration with project partners such as Komatsu and the Ugandan Ministry of Education and Sports – as well as rely on UNIDO’s long standing expertise in Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET).
The project supports “Uganda Vision 2040”, and focuses in particular on bridging the skills gap so that building, maintaining and improving the country’s road infrastructure can be done by skilled Ugandans.