Engineers Ireland registrar Damien Owens last month presented on the subject of the Dublin Accord at the Inaugural Conference for Technicians and TVET Semi-Professionals in Sarawak, Malaysia. This year’s conference focused on the accreditation and development of professional technicians to support the growing Malaysian economy and the planned industrial development in the Sarawak region on the island of Borneo. “The region has set itself ambitious targets in job creation 250,000 by 2015 and the key challenge is to ensure a supply of adequately skilled staff,” reported Owens. “Much of the job creation will be generated through foreign direct investment and, therefore, there’s a demand that staff are trained and recognised to international standards.” The Dublin Accord sets out learning outcomes and competences for engineering technicians and Malaysia is actively pursuing membership of the Accord. Malaysia is already a signatory of the Washington Accord through the Board of Engineers Malaysia. The conference was co-organised by the Malaysian Society for Engineering and Technology and Kuching Politeknik Sarawak.