DGT collaborates with Amazon Web Services India to offer skilling programs on emerging technologies
Author: BI Bureau
New Delhi: The Directorate General of Training (DGT), under Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE), is collaborating with Amazon Web Services (AWS) India to upskill students in cloud computing, data annotation, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning (ML), to boost their capabilities and employability.
This initiative will benefit students enrolled in the institutions under the DGT, an apex organisation responsible for implementing long-term institutional skill training through an extensive network of about 15,000 Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) and 33 National Skill Training Institutes (NSTIs), across India.
As part of this collaboration, AWS India will provide individuals with self-paced online learning programs in emerging technologies at no cost.This learning content will be offered on DGT’s Bharat Skills platform (https://bharatskills.gov.in), a central repository of updated curriculum, course content, digitally blended content, question banks, and learning videos of all courses under the Craftsmen Training Scheme (CTS) and Crafts Instructor Training Scheme (CITS).
Atul Kumar Tiwari, Secretary, MSDE said that we are making training on high-demand, emerging technologies available to students, opening up new opportunities for them, and enhancing their employability. Through this initiative with AWS. We are happy that students from ITIs and NSTIs can gain in-demand skills and hands-on experience in important areas such as cloud computing, data annotation, AI, and ML. The support that AWS will provide to train the faculty in these technologies will be valuable and empower them to deliver better learning outcomes.
Sunil PP, Lead—Education, Space, Non-profits, Channels and Alliances, AWS India Private Limited said that Cloud computing, AI, and ML are transforming nearly every industry, and developing a workforce skilled in these technologies is important to drive innovation and enhance the country’s competitiveness. By offering industry-relevant AWS-based curriculum and learning resources to learners and educators, we are investing in education at large, and developing India’s future digital workforce.
Recognizing data annotation as a critical aspect of the development of AI and ML projects as it makes datasets more usable and ready for innovation, AWS India will also enable DGT to train individuals in data annotation and labelling, using Amazon Sage Maker Ground Truth, a purpose-built service from AWS that easily enables labelling of training data for machine learning at scale. In addition, AWS will provide nominated education institutions under DGT with ready-to-teach cloud computing curriculum that prepares students to pursue industry-recognised certifications and in-demand cloud jobs.
The trend towards cloud adoption has been growing, especially since the pandemic necessitated organizations of all sizes to rapidly transform into digital businesses, innovate their business model, and enable remote working through several cloud-enabled services. According to the research “Asia Pacific Digital Skills Study: The Economic Benefits of a Tech-Savvy Workforce”, 92% of the 769 employers surveyed in India say at least one of the emerging technologies including AI, edge and quantum computing, block chain, and crypto currency, is likely to become a standard part of their future business operations. /BI/
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The exports of agricultural commodities from March to June 2020 shot up by 23.24 percent on-year to Rs 25,552.7 crores.
As the economy comes to a standstill amid the coronavirus-led lockdown, India’s agriculture sector has taken the baton of economic growth in its hands. The exports of agricultural commodities from March to June 2020 shot up by 23.24 percent on-year to Rs 25,552.7 crores, according to the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare. The government said that self-reliant agriculture is critical for the goal of an Atmanirbhar Bharat and for this, agricultural export is extremely important as besides earning foreign exchange for the country, the exports help farmers, producers, and exporters to take advantage of the wider international market and increase their income.
The surge in exports has also resulted in increased production in the farm sector by increasing coverage area and productivity. The share of India’s agricultural exports and imports in the world agriculture trade in 2017 was 2.27 percent and 1.90 percent, respectively. Even during the difficult time of pandemic lockdown, India took care not to disturb the world food supply chain and continued to export, the government said.
Ministry of Agriculture has prepared a comprehensive action plan for the promotion of Agri trade; the twofold approach focuses on boosting Agri Export with emphasis on value addition and action plan for Import Substitution. Recently, the Agriculture sector has witnessed a series of reforms, giving more choices to the farmers to sell their produce at competitive rates.
To mention a few, the Export strategy focuses on the export promotion of fast-evolving niche markets of Wellness food/ Health-conscious food/nutraceuticals, Development of “Brand India” in campaign mode to help penetration into new foreign markets and of new products which automatically translates into higher value realization, Gulf countries have been identified as focus destination to increase the market share which is a strong market for India though presently India caters to only 10-12% share of their total imports. A product-market matrix has been made containing a list of products of strength that could be expanded in new geographies and a list of known markets which can be introduced with newer products.
At the behest of the Department of Agricultural Cooperation & Farmers’ Welfare, Ministry of Agriculture, product-specific Export Promotion Forums have been created to lead Agri exports to new heights. Each Export Promotion Forum shall be having exporters of the related commodity as its members along with official members representing concerned Ministries/Departments of the Central and State Governments. Chairman APEDA shall be the chairman of each of these forums. The forums will meet at least once every two months, to discuss recommendations on issues pertaining to the export.
The recommendations of the forum will be placed in the product committee / Authority of APEDA. The Forum will keep in close contact with the concerned organization of the Ministry of Agriculture such as MIDH, Extension, NPPO, etc., DGFT, Ministry of Civil Aviation, MoFPI, etc. to further the interest of agricultural export.
