Center for Innovation and Textile Development (CIDITex) is created to strengthen capabilities and promote the attraction of talent.
June 6, 2024
The Apparel and Textile Industry is a constantly growing sector that represents 14% of Guatemala’s total exports. This growth has a direct impact on the increase of installed production capacity and therefore on the creation of new jobs.
This demand for capabilities generates the need to create competencies and opportunities for the effective integration of people in the industry, strengthening current skills and focusing on increasing productivity levels and adapting innovative technologies.
Currently, for example, there are more than 3,000 jobs in the garment industry alone in the municipalities of Guatemala, Villa Nueva and Mixco, which must be filled by people with the necessary skills and competencies. This number is expected to increase according to the amount of orders and investment that have been placed in the country.
To address this need, the Centro de Innovación y Desarrollo Textil -CIDITEX- was created through an agreement in alliance with the Universidad del Istmo (UNIS) and the Centro Educativo Técnico Laboral KINAL. This center will focus on research, technical training, and academic education for the apparel and textile industry and will seek to improve processes.
Alejandro Ceballos, director of Vestex, indicated that the sector generates more than 100,000 direct and indirect jobs, and by expanding its market share in the United States, it has the capacity to create many more.
“The idea, in the case of Kinal, is to train plant operators and multitaskers. In other words, personnel who not only learn to spin, but can also handle new technologies. On the other hand, with the Universidad del Istmo, we will be able to train textile engineers, which we currently do not have, and thus take advantage of the growth we are experiencing as an industry”.
Alejandro Ceballos
The Center will focus on three levels of attention: The operational-technical level; with the training of skilled labor for the industrial apparel area and, technicians for spinning, weaving and finishing. Middle management will be the second level to be served, with an administrative and technical focus. Lastly, we will attend to the managerial managers who work in the various activities of the sector.
CIDITex has initiated its actions through the “Andragogic Training Specialists” program, which is developed under a teaching approach aimed at adults using tools that are adapted to the learning capacity of this segment. The program aims to attract technicians with high knowledge in some field and provide them with the necessary training to raise their level of competence and instructional skills. At the end of the program, the technical specialists are certified as trainers and will have the ability to teach within their companies.
Together with KINAL, CIDITEX will meet operational and technical requirements ranging from industrial mechanical maintenance, steam boiler technicians, illustrators, and others, to industrial automation and specific technical specializations in the textile and apparel industry.
Through UNIS, Guatemala will have the first Master’s degree in Textile Engineering in the country, as a partnership has been strengthened with the U.S. University of North Carolina, recognized for training textile engineers who today work for companies in the Guatemalan textile sector. CIDITEX will also offer a Key Account diploma course, a diploma course on national legislation for the industry, programs that address import and export issues, training modules for supervisors, and others.
