ADI KESUMA PROGRAMME RECORDS 86.3 PER CENT GRADUATES SECURING JOBS

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 28 (Bernama) -- The Academy in Industry (ADI) programme under the Ministry of Human Resources (KESUMA) continues to demonstrate its effectiveness, with 86.3 per cent of its graduates securing employment, while 61 per cent of existing employees enjoyed a salary increase last year.

Deputy Minister of Human Resources Khairul Firdaus Akbar Khan said a total of 10,852 apprentices had registered under the programme, of whom 6,228 graduated, reflecting KESUMA’s efforts to strengthen the effectiveness of industry-based training.

He said the MADANI Government also places strong emphasis on improving job quality and aligning skills with industry needs through strategic collaborations with high-impact industry players such as PROTON, Huawei, PETRONAS and Daikin.

The move, he said, aims to ensure graduates are placed in jobs commensurate with their qualifications and high-value-added roles, in line with the government’s target of reducing the underemployment rate to 30 per cent by 2030.

“To achieve this, KESUMA has implemented an integrated strategy across agencies and departments to address underemployment, particularly among Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) graduates, through coordinated training, expanded apprenticeship opportunities and job matching based on labour market data.

“This effort is intended to better coordinate labour supply and demand by integrating various initiatives and platforms under KESUMA,” he said during a question-and-answer session at the Dewan Rakyat today.

He was responding to a question from Datuk Awang Hashim (PN–Pendang) on the government’s strategy to address graduate underemployment, including job placement rates by field of study and industry sector.

Khairul Firdaus said the measures are further strengthened through industry demand-driven training mapped to the National Occupational Skills Standards (NOSS) and complemented by In-Service Training.

These measures have raised the graduate employability rate to over 90 per cent, with 85.1 per cent securing jobs aligned with their fields of study, he said.

He added that four Advanced Technology Colleges under the Department of Manpower (ADTEC JTM) are projected to achieve a 100 per cent employability rate by 2025, namely the ADTEC JTM campuses in Pasir Gudang, Bukit Katil, Kota Kinabalu and Kepala Batas.

According to him, the three highest-performing clusters in terms of field-relevant job placement are transportation (90.3 per cent), engineering services (88.6 per cent) and electrical maintenance (88.5 per cent), significantly surpassing the national averages of 57.6 per cent for postgraduate and 53.3 per cent for diploma graduates.

“This success is further reinforced by feedback showing that 97.5 per cent of employers are satisfied with the performance of ADTEC JTM students during their industrial training,” he said.

He added that as of December 2025, the Social Security Organisation (PERKESO) had implemented 3,715 job placement programmes, facilitating the placement of 61,997 individuals, primarily in the manufacturing, wholesale and retail trade sectors (25,481) as well as the professional, scientific and technical sectors (13,760).

-- BERNAMA