MIDA Facilitates Overseas Internship for Malaysian Students Abroad

Enhancing the students’ employability has always been on top of the human capital development agenda of the Government. This is to ensure that they are industry-relevant, ready to enter the job market and ultimately able to contribute to the economic growth of the country. Various programmes are usually adopted by universities and colleges to increase the employability of their students such as internship, career awareness program, industry talk, curriculum embedment, and lecturer’s attachment to industry.

The internship is one of the programs undertaken by universities in the world to expose their students early for industrial training or employment at the actual workplace of companies before they complete their studies. The internship duration varies from one university to another, ranges from 3 months to 9 months. Students can later be offered a permanent job if they meet the criteria or job requirement.

In line with this, as part of the organisation’s ongoing efforts to effectively address investors’ talent needs, MIDA through its overseas centres collaborates with JPA and MARA in organising the overseas internship programmes. These programmes aim to facilitate Malaysian sponsored students (under JPA and MARA) studying abroad to secure placement for internships with foreign investors or MNCs that have operations in Malaysia.

For example, MIDA Germany, both Frankfurt and Munich offices have assisted Malaysian students in getting internships with German companies. The number of Malaysian students in Germany quadrupled in the last ten years. Currently, close to 1,000 young JPA, MARA and private Malaysian students study in degree courses in German universities, taking advantage of the cutting-edge science and engineering courses offered there. In collaboration with the JPA and MARA offices based in Frankfurt as well as the Consulat General Office, MIDA Germany has successfully persuaded German companies who have operations in Malaysia to offer internships to Malaysian students. Companies that are working very closely with MIDA include BMW, Infineon, Mühlbauer, Osram, Daimler, Porsche, BASF, B.Braun, Schmidt & Clemens, Esmo Group to name a few.

In 2017, MIDA Paris collaborated with the Malaysian Students Associations in France (MASAF) to organise the Career Fair Weekend 2017 in Paris. The platform served as a meeting avenue for participating French companies to get in touch with Malaysian students who studied in renowned French education institutions. It was also used by the students to find internship offers or recruitment upon graduation. In 2018, MIDA Paris and MASAF co-organised a CV Workshop and Industrial Insights 2018 in Toulouse. The event was successfully attended by 40 Malaysian students and 5 French companies namely GIFAS (aerospace association), PIRIOU Group (shipbuilding and MRO), Daher (aerospace, defence, nuclear and automotive industrial sectors in the fields of manufacturing, services and transport), Orinox (experts in plant engineering digitalisation) and Ciel & Tierre (solar energy equipment supplier). These companies were keen on looking for students for internship.

MIDA Seoul is still at an initial stage of promoting overseas internship among Korean companies. As a first initiative, MIDA Seoul together with Korea Industrial Technology Association (KOITA), Embassy of Malaysia, Malaysia External Trade Development Corporation (MATRADE) and Education Department (JPA) co-organised a Seminar on Business Opportunities in Malaysia on 22nd April 2019, and one of the topics presented and discussed during the seminar was on “Malaysian Talent Pool: What Malaysian students can offer”.

MIDA Japan (Tokyo and Osaka) has facilitated several Japanese companies in their efforts to employ and train Malaysian students graduated from Japanese universities through close collaboration with the Human Resource Development Counsellor at the Embassy of Malaysia in Tokyo and Malaysian Students’ Association in Japan (MSAJ). Some of these companies will provide trainings in Japan before dispatching the employees back to their Malaysian facility. Companies which have adopted this initiative include Rohm Wako Electronics, Roland Corporation, Taiyo Yuden, Panac and Seiko Electric.

Among the benefits of the overseas internship for companies include gaining access to a broader base of the highly qualified Malaysian talent pool for their operations in Malaysia; reduce costs by placing Malaysians who are already in their home country for training, and leverage on the company’s state-of-the-art facilities, infrastructure and operations in their home country. The students on the other hand will gain better opportunity to be employed as they have obtained the necessary practical experience with MNCs/foreign companies which have operations in Malaysia.

MIDA’s initiative to enhance the employability of Malaysian overseas graduates is in line with the aspiration of the Government to ensure companies investing in Malaysia are able to secure qualified high knowledge talent with practical experience.

Going forward, MIDA has developed an online platform with the support of JPA and MARA, namely the Overseas Internship & Management Trainee Program Portal. The objective of this initiative is to facilitate internship or management trainee opportunities for Malaysian sponsored students (under MARA and JPA) studying abroad and encourage foreign investors and MNCs to provide employment opportunities and industrial trainings. The link to the portal is https://overseastrainee.mida. gov.my/. The portal is managed by the Industry Talent Management And Expatriate Division of MIDA. For further information, please email to [email protected].