Tourism Min financing skill upgrade mission

New Delhi In a bid to upgrade skills in its sector, the Ministry of Tourism has decided to provide financial assistance for Hunar Se Rozgar Tak (HSRT, literally ‘from skill to employment’) training under the Capacity Building for Service Providers (CBSP) Scheme.

The Tourism Ministry will provide financial assistance to industrial units, private entities, associations of industries and professional and skill-developing agencies with proven credentials and hospitality institutes officially approved, official sources told Bizz Buzz.

The HSRT programme is aimed at targeting persons with inadequate means and in need to acquire skills facilitative to employment. The objective of the programme is to create employable skills among youth specific to the hospitality sector and to reduce the skill gap that afflicts the sector. It further aims at working towards the dispersal of the economic benefits of the growing tourism sector to the poor.

The HSRT programme is also aimed at facilitating self-employment of the pass-outs by assisting entrepreneurs in obtaining loans (for example, Mudra), licenses, registrations, etc. It will also explore their deployment at the mega tourist destinations and circuits.

While the main objectives of the HSRT programme are to provide free training, evaluation, and certification in job-oriented skill courses to deserving candidates, in the case of entrepreneurs it is also about enhancing their market acceptability.

This is because entrepreneurs are job creators. So, all assistance should be given to them. Besides, tourism has an enormous potential of employment generation at all levels. If entrepreneurs in the sector are given enough training and support, a lot of jobs will be created, the sources said.

The government is quite bullish on the travel market in India, which it believes will grow to $125 billion by 2026-27 from an estimated $75 billion in 2019-20.

As per the official estimates, foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs) in India will reach 30.5 million by 2028. There were 10.93 million FTAs during pre-pandemic year 2019. In 2022, the number was 6.19 million, up from 1.52 million during 2021.