KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 11 — Datuk Seri M. Saravanan said he hopes Malaysia can offer better courses for students at higher learning educations so that many of them won’t be left jobless after graduation.

The human resources minister said courses for subjects such as business administration or management are outdated and should be replaced with ones in line with Industrial Revolution 4.0 and 5.0, both of which encourage constant upskilling and reskilling of labour.

He said his ministry found that post-pandemic, most of the jobs on offer cannot employ first-generation graduates as their degrees or diplomas have become obsolete.

He said many graduates he spoke to told him they have been jobless for five years and are struggling to find work relevant to their qualifications.

"The biggest challenge is not unemployment. Our unemployment rate has dropped from 5.3 per cent to 3.9 per cent. The biggest challenge is mismatching (of jobs).

"First-generation graduates are not getting the right jobs, especially those with business and administration degrees.

"If they want to survive, they need to reskill and upskill every time, or their degree or diploma will be void five to 10 years down the road,” Saravanan said during a press conference after launching the mynext by Talentcorp event at Sime Darby Convention Centre today.

Saravanan lamented the fact subjects like business are still offered by higher learning institutions.

He said learning business skills must come after the fact and studying medicine, engineering and architecture should be a priority.

"Business degree holders often end up being salesman, or now, with the fancy name of business development manager or executive.

"They can’t find jobs and the ministry spends millions to upgrade them with soft skills.

"Hence, I have asked the Ministry of Higher Education to look into this matter and start offering subjects that are relevant. The education system needs this change to happen,” he added.

Saravanan was launching the mynext by TalentCorp programme which is a multi-ministry collaboration to find jobs for graduates in Malaysia.

mynext Talent assists students and individuals in the workforce, while mynext University supports institutions of higher learning with the aim of developing trainees to meet industry demands.

In addition, mynext Company aims to support the national workforce by integrating talent solutions and analytics onto one platform to connect the talent supply with future jobs.

As of July 2022, more than 170,000 talents across various education institutions have registered for the programme.