The Agricultural and Industrial Training Bureau (AITB), in collaboration with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), is set to kick off a two-day capacity-building initiative aimed at fortifying the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) sector in Liberia.
The workshop targets TVET administrators and key sector actors to familiarize them with the National TVET Qualifications Framework (NTQF) and operational guidelines, aiming to enhance institutional capacities, ensure program quality and consistency, and align Liberia's TVET system with global standards.
UNESCO, which is funding and leading the training exercise, is a specialized agency dedicated to strengthening our shared humanity through the promotion of education, science, culture, and communication.
The organization sets standards, produces tools and develops knowledge to create solutions to some of the world's greatest challenges of our time, while advancing quality education, safeguarding heritage, and ensuring access to reliable information across its 194 Member States globally.
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In Liberia, UNESCO has been mainly involved in enhancing educational opportunities for Liberians, especially less privileged children.
The AITB is the government's foremost technical and vocational skills development regulatory institution. Established in 1981 by Decree No. 56, it serves as the technical and administrative secretariat of the National Council for Vocational/Technical Education and Training.
Its primary objective is to address Liberia's manpower needs and contribute to the country's economic and social development by providing various technical and vocational skills.
AITB's core mandates include developing a TVET curriculum, monitoring TVET institutions for compliance, accrediting TVET institutions, conducting trade testing, and training TVET teachers. However, following the civil war and the transition to democratic governance, the institution has been inactive and labeled as "moribund" during Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's government.
The conception of the upcoming training exercise stemmed from AITB's formal requests for support from UNESCO in July 2024 and January 2025 to bolster the TVET sector through improved awareness, education, and implementation of national TVET standards and guidelines.
In response to the requests, UNESCO officially reached out to AITB to rally stakeholders for the pending workshop slated for May 20, 2025.
AITB Director General, Abraham Billy disclosed in an interview the workshop is a great step in the right direction for the TVET sector in the country as it will broaden the minds of stakeholders about the national standards.
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"Capacity building is at the center of what we are doing at the Bureau. We want to see all of our TVET stakeholders from across the country and our staff," Billy told the Daily Observer. "So, We are grateful to UNESCO for providing us this opportunity to train our stakeholders. This is the beginning of a great partnership, and I believe that it will go a long way."
The AITB DG indicated that the primary objectives of the training workshops are to educate TVET administrators and stakeholders on the NTQF and operational guidelines, enhance institutional capabilities to enforce national standards, raise public awareness on skills development, promote consistent program delivery, and institute monitoring and evaluation mechanisms for sustained compliance with national TVET standards.
Anticipated outcomes include heightened understanding of national standards among stakeholders, improved institutional capacities for implementing and monitoring compliance, increased enrolment rates in TVET programs, enhanced program efficacy aligned with market demands, and the establishment of ongoing monitoring and evaluation systems.
The expected impact of these initiatives is to cultivate a more robust, standardized TVET system in Liberia, align education outputs with labor market needs, empower a skilled workforce for national development, foster stakeholder engagement in quality assurance, and set the stage for regional collaboration in West Africa's TVET systems.
