Sharjah to establish a library in every workers’ housing facility

Sharjah: A project has been launched to establish a library in every housing facility of blue-collar workers in Sharjah.

The announcement came on International Literacy Day marked on September 8 by Labour Standards Development Authority (LSDA) in Sharjah, as part of a wider programme to improve workers’ reading, writing and maths skills to raise their job prospects.

LSDA, in cooperation with Sharjah’s ‘Culture Without Borders’ initiative, has launched the workers’ library project. These libraries will be provided with various sources of information in several languages and constantly replenished.

LSDA chairman Salem Yousef Al Qaseer said the authority had previously coordinated many educational courses for workers, including English courses in cooperation with American University of Sharjah. He added that the authority plans to conduct more of these courses to give workers the opportunity to acquire skills they currently lack. LSDA also plans to have permanent halls in labour public parks to hold such courses for workers.

The authority has implemented “an ambitious plan”, during which it succeeded in integrating hundreds of workers into the “cultural scene” of the city. It had coordinated the attendance of hundreds of workers at educational seminars and lectures held in their languages at the previous edition of the Sharjah International Book Fair.