The Industrial Automation Technology (IAT) Extension Project for Central Asian and Middle East Countries in the Republic of Turkey

The Industrial Automation Technology Extension Project for Central Asian and Middle East Countries (IATE Project) was launched in February 2012 to enhance the technical education and vocational training capacity on the IAT of target countries, for Country-Focused Training: Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Pakistan; and for Group Training: Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Palestine, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.  This project was scaled up from Turkey’s Strengthening the Program of Expanding Industrial Automation Technologies Departments (SPREAD) Project, which aimed to develop an implementation structure in the Turkish Teacher Training Center (TTC) to provide training courses to teachers.

A team composed of experts from the Turkish TTC, Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency (TIKA) and JICA held a one-week survey to each country during May and June 2012 to carry out a needs assessment.  Through visits to and discussions with relevant authorities, the team developed a suitable curriculum for each country as well as possible targets of the training program. The Country-Focused Training Program was planned from 2012 to 2015, and total of ten participants from the abovementioned four countries each year work attend three-week workshops in Turkey. The Group Training program aims to provide basic training on IAT-related disciplines to TVE teachers in five target countries: Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Palestine, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. This program will be implemented from 2012 to 2015, and in these three years, total of 60 teachers will be trained. Two courses will be conducted each year. For each training course, total of ten participants, two participants from each country, will be invited to four-week workshop in Turkey.