ABOUT 3,000 people have registered to train with the Management Development & Productivity Institute (MDPI) for various courses related to operations in the country’s oil and gas sector.

Scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2011, the courses, developed by MDPI which is under the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare, are designed to satisfy the demands of the emerging sector.

Making this known at a meet-the-press event in Accra recently, Enoch Teye Mensah, Minister of Employment & Social Welfare, said the institute would also run various Masters programmes in General Management for public service officials.

Noting that the institute would re-launch the National Productivity Week to promote productivity consciousness among Ghana’s labour force, he emphasised the need for quality human resource development.

Institutions that are also collaborating with MDPI to provide the courses include the National Vocational Training Institute (NVTI), Integrated Community Centres for Employable Skills, Opportunities Industrialization Centres and the Department of Social Welfare.

NVTI has trained some 9,648 trainees as instructors, apprentices, drivers and offered on-the-job training to many job seekers.

An additional 29,000 candidates are expected to undergo training in trade tests.

The minister said his outfit was conferring with its development partners to retool all the NVTI institutes to enable trainees to operate modern equipment.

The oil sector is expected to train more people in the coming years.