ASEAN to Ratify Mutual Recognition Arrangement for Tourism Professionals

Governments from around ASEAN are to join with tourism industry stakeholders next month to ratify a Mutual Recognition Arrangement for Tourism Professionals (MRA-TP) in Jakarta, Indonesia.

The standardisation and benchmarking of skills affects 32 job profiles in tourism and hospitality among the 10 ASEAN member states.

The adoption of the agreement is designed to help boost service standards and encourage intra-ASEAN mobility among tourism employees.

The new benchmarking will affect jobs in hotels such as front office, housekeeping, food and beverage services, as well as tour operations, food production and travel agencies.

“The fulfillment of the MRA-TP initiative will boost the quality of services, as it will create mobile, trained and confident skilled-labour suited to travel industry needs,” said Mr Arief Yahya, Minister of Tourism, Indonesia.

In 2002, ASEAN leaders agreed to upgrade tourism education curricula and skills and formulate competency standards and certification agreements that would be mutually recognised across the region.

Now, with 32 job types benchmarked, 52 qualifications initiated and 242 training ‘toolboxes’ created for ASEAN, accompanied by trainers and skill assessors together with its registration system, the MRA-TP process can now be formally ratified in Jakarta. 

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