JEDDAH: Prince Naif Bin Abdul Aziz, Second Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior, has asked Saudi universities to draw up a strategy to secure “jobs matching the needs of the labor market for every Saudi graduate”. Speaking at a meeting Saturday with senior academic and university representatives, Prince Naif said that Saudi universities were “blessed with staff capable of producing successful graduates”. “What we need, however, is for our universities to put in place a strategy in accordance with the needs of the job market to find jobs for every graduate,” he said. “Unemployment is an evil and a cause of crime in various forms, one of the most common being the dealing in and use of drugs.” He described university students as “sons and daughters who have been entrusted to university teachers to give them the appropriate training and prepare them to fulfill labor market needs”. “I hope that the Kingdom's universities can study and research the problems of society and youth and introduce programs to help solve them,” Prince Naif said. “I hope that universities can in those studies have a role in addition to their educational one. Advanced countries always depend on scientific and academic research from universities and research centers,” he said.
