SThe first point of action in reorganising the demographic structure of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is increasing provision of training and development programmes to reduce reliance on foreign and temporary labour, the federation's president has insisted.

Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan's statement came in a wide-reaching speech on the issues facing the UAE, in which he went on to state that the next tenet of the multilevel strategy was to promote a culture of self dependence in areas of industry which have commonly relied on foreign workers.

Following on from this, the president's third action was to "[pay] the financial cost of foreign labour from developed terms and conditions of recruiting to the extent that makes the cost attractive to domestic alternatives".

In other recent developments, Business 24-7 has noted that training and development centres will play a key role in providing a well-equipped workforce which is capable of meeting the needs of an evolving energy sector in the UAE.

Oil and Gas Directory: Training and Development