Two-thirds of Asia Pacific Employers Demand Retraining for Sector Switchers

More than two-thirds of employers across six Asia Pacific markets say they always or often require extra training, certification or assessment when hiring workers from related sectors. That figure comes from a new report by Opito, a nonprofit skills and safety authority, based on a survey of 390 workers and employers in Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

The survey covered safety-critical industries such as oil and gas and mining. The core finding: skills earned in one sector don't reliably transfer to another. For Opito, this creates friction for a just transition (the principle that decarbonisation shouldn't strand experienced workers) by forcing people to repeat training unnecessarily — or risk employers doubting their competence.

Why don't employers trust cross-sector skills?

Confidence is the problem, and the numbers show where it breaks. Among respondents:

• 57 per cent said trust breaks down when training or certification isn't recognised across sectors, employers, projects or geographies.
• 55 per cent cited difficulty verifying practical competence — whether a worker can actually do the job safely, not just hold a certificate.

Put simply, employers can't easily check that a certificate from one project means the same thing on another. That uncertainty gets resolved through mandatory retraining, which slows worker mobility.

What would fix it?

Respondents pointed to standardisation. 61 per cent identified globally aligned training and safety standards as the key to building confidence in workforce mobility, and the figure rises to 74 per cent in Malaysia. Another 55 per cent called for clearer recognition of existing certifications.

Opito's report recommends mapping overlapping competencies between sectors while keeping environment-specific training where it genuinely matters. That would widen career choices and help employers deploy experienced workers across projects and sectors.

What does this mean for individual workers?

For an oil and gas engineer eyeing renewables, the market position is uneven. Hydrogen, carbon capture and renewables need new capabilities but draw heavily on experience built in established safety-critical industries, Opito says. The barrier isn't a lack of relevant skills — it's proving those skills count somewhere new. Until recognition frameworks catch up, workers face duplicated certification costs and hiring delays when they switch sectors or countries.

The wider regional picture

The skills problem sits inside a broader energy transition. In October, members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreed on an enhanced memorandum of understanding for the Asean Power Grid, advancing cross-border electricity connections and trade.

Worker-focused initiatives are running in parallel. The International Labour Organization is contributing to a skills roadmap in Indonesia to support economic diversification in coal-dependent regions. In the Philippines, it's pursuing an approach that combines skills development, social protection and enterprise support.

What did Opito's leaders say?

"As Asia Pacific accelerates its energy transition, a just transition has to be a workforce transition too," said Ooi Suan Hoe, Opito's senior vice president of strategic partnerships for Asia Pacific.

"The answer is not to lower the bar on safety," Ooi said. "It is for industry to work together to understand what is genuinely equivalent, bridge the differences that remain and create clear, trusted pathways for people to move between sectors."

Chief executive Stephen Marcos Jones said the convergence of renewables and oil and gas creates chances to exchange knowledge and skills. "Workers need to know that their experience will be recognised when they work across countries or industries, and employers need confidence that safety standards will be consistent across more diverse workforces," he said.

Jones added: "Our goal is to work with industry partners to develop a shared language of safety, so skills can travel more widely." Expect the recognition debate to intensify as hydrogen, carbon capture and renewables projects scale hiring across the region through the Asean Power Grid build-out.