"At the national Two Sessions, it is of profound significance to fully leverage the advantages of local vocational colleges in education and cultivate agricultural professionals who can stand firm, stay committed, and deeply engage in rural development," said Xie Qingmei, a National People's Congress delegate and the Dean of the Research Institute of South China Agricultural University. She proposed increasing the establishment of agricultural science majors and the cultivation of local agricultural industry talents in local higher vocational colleges.
Through her research, Xie Qingmei found some issues in the training of agricultural professionals in local vocational colleges. These include a mismatch between the majors offered by local vocational colleges and the talents needed for regional agricultural industry development, as well as a shortage of majors related to agriculture. Additionally, some local higher vocational colleges do not offer agricultural science majors, which contributes to difficulties in enrollment and employment. "Many local colleges have few majors related to agriculture, and the talent cultivation mechanism for agriculture is not sound."
To strengthen the cultivation of local agricultural talents, Xie Qingmei suggested:
Collaborating with the education and agriculture departments to require local vocational colleges to appropriately set up majors related to agriculture based on local industry (county-level) development. Considering the local agricultural industry, it is advisable to increase majors such as agricultural sciences (fruits, vegetables, tea, etc.), animal husbandry and veterinary sciences (livestock farming, pets), plant protection, resource and environmental sciences, forestry and landscape architecture, and food processing. The scale of students in majors related to agriculture should match the demand of local industries, without oversupply.
Increasing support for the cultivation of talents in majors related to agriculture in local vocational colleges. On the one hand, appropriately increasing the faculty in majors related to agriculture, improving teaching conditions, increasing financial investment, attracting more technical resources and faculty to local vocational colleges, leveraging the role of local enterprises in cultivating agricultural talents, and promoting organic connections between talent cultivation and industrial demand. On the other hand, by reducing or exempting tuition fees for students in majors related to agriculture, attracting students from impoverished mountainous areas to attend nearby colleges, and addressing the enrollment difficulties of majors related to agriculture in local vocational colleges.
Ensuring that students graduating from majors related to agriculture in local vocational colleges can find employment locally. This can be achieved by expanding the vocational education pathway for agricultural professions, ensuring personalized and categorized training, and ensuring that a certain proportion of outstanding graduates in majors related to agriculture can enter the civil service or public sectors at the county, town, or village level. Pre-enrollment talent customization agreements can also be signed with students, and after graduation, they can be directly allocated to local jobs by the local human resources department according to demand, with continuous follow-up on their development.
