National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC)
NSDC is a not-for profit Company set up by the Ministry of Finance, under Companies Act to promote skill development with the help of the private sector. It was launched in 2009, primarily to enable skills-related training through private-sector partners with the objective of skilling 150 million people by 2022.
Basically, NSDC’s role is to promote private sector participation in skill development. Private sector cooperation is necessary for nationwide promotion of skill development as private sector has funds, trainers and institutions besides offering large variety of jobs to the workforce.
Hence the NSDC has an organization structure of a PPP entity. The equity holding of the company is that 51% of equities are held by private sector players especially industry organizations. The rest 49% is held by the government. Of the 13 directors of NSDC, nine are from private sector and the rest from government.
NSDC funds several skill development initiatives, SSCs and other activities including the setting up of large number of vocational institutions in the country. Here, the Corporation is encouraging private sector players to provide low-cost training.
Key activities done by NSDC are:
- Funding and incentivizing skill development programmes and Sector Skill Councils.
- Providing services such as innovation, skill gap and other studies, train the trainer programmes and initiating international collaboration.
- Creating s sustainable ecosystem for skill development.
The NSDC has been operating through partnerships with other stakeholders in skill formation and thereby creating a skilling ecosystem viz. It partners with the private sector players, Central Ministries, State Governments, universities and schools etc. NSDC is working with 21 universities for aligning education and training to National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF).
NSDC gives funds to assist partner entities for enhancing the employability of work force. Funds are provided in the form of soft loans, equity and grants, or even a combination of one or more instruments.
