A total of 61 young Mozambican students have graduated from Huawei’s Seeds for the Future programme after they finished a short-term training in the information and communications technology (ICT) sector.
The graduation ceremony held in the capital of Maputo on Friday was attended by Mateus Magala, Mozambican minister of transport and communications, Wang Hejun, Chinese ambassador to Mozambique, and Zhang Junming, director general of Huawei Mozambique.
Since the program began in the country in 2016, 15 percent of graduates have been able to work in national telecommunications companies, according to Huawei.
Magala thanked Huawei for its role in developing the country’s human and institutional capabilities.
“We recommend Huawei to continue establishing partnerships with Mozambican companies in the telecommunications sector, paying special attention to the absorption of young Mozambican talents. The sustainability of telecommunications growth is in the hands of young talents who reveal themselves in initiatives such as the Seeds for The Future program,” he said.
The minister said the program tends to be more inclusive in terms of gender and regional coverage of the country. “It is our expectation that this program will continue to encourage women’s participation in the area of ICT, recognizing the digital focus by gender.”
He added that the government attaches great importance to investing in the development of human capacity through the Seeds for The Future program, as it is necessary for achieving the desired digitalization of the country.
“The Chinese side is willing to continue to plant the seeds of exchange, wisdom, and cooperation together with the Mozambican side in order to seek cooperation, share opportunities, and achieve development with the Mozambican side, continuously strengthening the basis of China-Mozambique friendship,” said the Chinese ambassador.
According to Wang, the aim is to firmly build a solid social foundation of Sino-Mozambican cooperation and better serve the long-term and stable socio-economic development of Mozambique, and this makes digital cooperation a significant driving force that can contribute to the improvement of the China-Mozambique Comprehensive Strategic Cooperative Partnership.
Alexandre Amade, one of the graduates and a student at Eduardo Mondlane University, told Xinhua that the training was incredible, and he was able to learn a lot.
“It was a wonderful experience. Having this learning now opens our vision to these technologies. It has definitely opened my mind to what I can do in the future,” Amade said. “May they continue to do more events like this, for us students, for young people who still want to pursue our future.”