THE Government of Japan committed to help enhance Filipinos’ information technology (IT) skills to take advantage of employment opportunities in the area.

Last April 5, 2019, Japan representative Takahiko Shiba handed to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) a check amounting to over P196 million for the 380 school beneficiaries of the Personal Computers for Public Schools (PCPS) Project phase 5 in Visayas and Mindanao, including the Davao City National High School (DNCHS) where the launching was held.

In his speech, Shiba assured that they will continue to support and help strengthen IT education in the country through the project as they recognized its importance in the global economy.

The project was funded by Japan under its Non-Project Grant Aid- Counter Value Fund (NPGA-CVF) in partnership with the Department of Education (DepEd) and the DTI. Since 2001, Japan has distributed around 64,000 computers to 5,400 schools.

DTI Davao Regional Director Maria Belenda Ambi said that ICT illiteracy should be addressed so that the country will be able to be globally competitive.

"Because you cannot be competitive if you are a computer illiterate. Through this project, IT skills of Filipino Youth will be enhanced as the country’s future knowledge workers and also they will be able to produce competitive students as a product of this program," she said.

DTI Undersecretary Ireneo Vizmonte said PCPS is one of the longest-running projects of DTI and they are proud that it is one of the most successful.

“The DTI started the project with the goal of developing of continues pool of IT skilled workers for the IT services industry. The Philippines was recognized as a very competitive advantage in the field of IT services,” he said.

“So in response to this challenge, the government affirmed that they should strengthen IT investments on human resource capital. The agencies that promotes the competitiveness of the Filipino are the DTI partner with key government agencies like DepEd and DOST and the private sectors like Intel and Microsoft,” he added. (With Arrianne Kate S. Arilla, USEP intern)