Human resource: A key issue to develop Vietnam Logistics

On January 22nd, 2014, the Prime Minister approved Project to Develop Logistics Services in Transport until 2020, vision to 2030. Human resource training is one of the solutions. In fact, the issue of human resource is a bottleneck of Vietnam Logistics. Mr. Nguyen Cong Bang- Deputy Director of Transport Department, The Ministry of Transport, an expert in the field- had a talk with VLR.

LOGISTICS HUMAN RESOURCE: WEAK IN EVERYTHING

There has been an idea that only a few of 6,000 people working in the field of logistics are experienced and have knowledge of international law. What do you think about it?

There have been different figures about the number of companies operating in logistics field in Vietnam and about the number of people working in the field. However, most of enterprises are small in size and weak in ability. They meet around 20-25% of requirements only. The current human resource accordingly meets the needs of these small-scaled enterprises and thus, training tasks have not been received appropriate attention.

According to results of investigations by The Institute of Research and Development of the NationalEconomicsUniversity, 80.26% of personnel of logistics enterprises is trained from their daily work; 23.6% takes part in training courses in the country; 6.8% is trained by hired foreign experts; and 3.9% receives training abroad.

Does it mean we are lacking “proper” training?

Talking about logistics is talking about the circulation of cargo flow including foreign trade, finance, law, transport, IT and many other related service. Unluckily, logistics has not been taught properly at universities of finance, foreign trade, law or economics.

Logistics and multi modal transport is currently taught only in the University of Transport of HCMC, and it is only in the second enrollment. In the University of Maritime, the logistics center has just been founded and Logistics Department belongs to the Faculty of Economic Sea Transport

It can be seen that it is really hard to transfer knowledge of a complex chain of business like logistics to students with current training.

Vietnam’s logistics human resource mainly comes from liners’ agencies, freight forwarding companies and it is used according to their current abilities. Human resource with basic knowledge of logistics is already small in number and thus it is almost impossible to have one with deep knowledge of logistics sector.

From experience from countries with developed logistics sector, staff, besides professional knowledge of logistics, should also have knowledge of international and national law, IT and foreign language for sustainable development.

It is urgent that human resource for logistics sector be urgently developed.

LOGISTICS HUMAN RESOURCE NEEDS A SPECIFIC STRATEGY

Vietnam

There are many things to do, from building a teaching staff to training documents. Currently, logistics or logistics-relating subjects mostly teach about sea transport and sea forwarding, there has been no appropriate attention to the development of other transport sectors, new techniques of freight forwarding as multi modal transport, supply chain management skills…

Factors needed for logistics are equipment, procedures, IT, law and personnel (also called hardware). Only when it is equipped with comprehensive knowledge with international standard, human resource at the time can be considered “software” of the sector – a condition for sustainable development- a thing that we badly lack.

Vietnam is facing the issue that most of graduated students are unable to find jobs, enterprises lack human resource. Can students of logistics department be an exception?

We are having many “bottlenecks and paradoxes”. For example, a student who wants to improve his knowledge has to study abroad by his own money. When he brings the knowledge to apply in Vietnam, operating chains in Vietnam are not compatible to what he has learned abroad. This is a common issue, which can be found in the logistics sector.

For current requirements of human resource, we have to make good use of the existing human resource in combination with training tasks and re-training tasks.

In long term, logistics should be taught at other universities as law, finance, foreign trade… and logistics schools should be gradually founded. It is also important to have consulting tasks for choosing logistics department at university entrance exams. This is, in fact, a promising sector with high income; however, many students and parents have no information about the sector.

In my opinion, there should have a specific strategy for logistics human resource training.

MORE INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION IN TRAINING

What does international cooperation mean?

We have been in a long distance behind the world. And thus, there should be cooperation in training, training programs, and books… In the Project of Developing Logistics Services in the field of transport until 2020, orientation to 2030 approved by the Prime Minister, human resource training is attached to international cooperation. And it is not merely the Minister of Transport’s tasks. There should be cooperation from other Ministries as Trade and Commerce, Education and Training and local authorities.

Vietnam

There is the research “Technical Assistance to Multi Modal Transport for the Ministry of Transport”- an important content in the Project of Developing Transport Infrastructure in the Mekong Delta (Project WB5). The research and its results is to help the Ministry of Transport in developing policies and intervention methods to improve transport in Vietnam in general and to improve multi modal transport and logistics in Vietnam in particular, among which there is an issue of human training.

The Ministry of Transport, in cooperation with WB and consulted by ALG-Spain, has held 6 successful training courses in Hanoi, HCMC, Nghe An, BR-VT in multi modal transport, logistics and ports for units and departments belonging to Ministries, sectors and enterprises.

These courses help to improve awareness of the modern type of business and give enterprises opportunities to exchange experience, knowledge and suggestions to one another and to the State’s organizations as well. This also contributes in the process of building the State’s practical transparent policies. Students in these courses have opportunities to approach documents and practical experience and they can transfer this knowledge to other members of their companies’ staff.