Malaysia urgently needs to improve its technical talent pool

MALAYSIA’S recent statistical report on its labour market shows that more than one-third of its tertiary graduates are engaged in semi-skilled or low-skilled jobs. In 2022, their number was close to two million.

By occupational classification, semi-skilled jobs include those engaged in the service industry working as, for instance, sales persons, clerks, accounting assistants, non-professionals in agriculture, fisheries, forestry, and animal husbandry, as well as machinery or assembly line operators, general maintenance technicians, and other jobs with basic skills in the industrial sector. Low-skilled jobs refer to jobs that can be performed easily without specific training, such as cleaning.