The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) established its IPAS (Industrial Professional Assessment System), adding eight assessments aimed at industrial professional engineers in 2016. After less than three months of propagation, the assessments received 155 agreements from industries and 187 agreements from universities. Additionally, it will be the first certification issued directly from the MOEA, and is expected to be an incentive to wrap up 300 industrial agreements and more than 8,000 sign-ups this year.
To narrow the gap between academia and industry, the assessments are designed and chosen based on the most urgent needs of the industry. Positions in demand include PCB process engineer, antenna design engineer, machine tool mechanical design engineer, electric vehicle mechatronics engineer, certified valuator, mobile app developer, mobile game programmer, and food quality assurance engineer.
The MOEA Industrial Professional Assessments not only increase an individual’s self-competitiveness among the other competitors, it also provides a higher possibility to be hired with more favorable conditions. Meanwhile, the MOEA and the Ministry of Education are cooperating to reach more agreements from industries and universities with the assessments. It is believed that by connecting government policy, industry and academia, the competitive strength of professions in Taiwan will be raised considerably.