Nobel Memorial Prize winner Gary Becker theorized that investing in human capital through education and training is central to the socioeconomic development of all countries. His ideas became hugely influential, and many nations have since poured a great deal of resources into the sector.
Cambodia needs to follow suit. As things stand, it faces a shortage of high-skilled workers — something a country that aspires to be competitive in the global market through industrial development simply cannot afford. But there’s a way past this bottleneck — provided that the government can develop a holistic road map informed by lessons learned from success stories in advanced industrial economies.
Meeting this challenge is a crucial step before Cambodia can become a knowledge-based economy and meet its development goals, including plans to upgrade to an upper-middle-income country by 2030 and then to a high-income one by 2050.
