Bulletin shows engineering majors ‘stagnant’, advises students to pursue other disciplines

AMMAN — The Jordanian Engineers Association (JEA) issued the 13th guidance bulletin for engineering majors in universities based on the needs of the labour market.

The bulletin showed that engineering majors and sub-disciplines face an increasingly saturated labour market, which is exacerbated by the high number of engineering students in the Kingdom. There has been a severe decline in job opportunities as a result of the closure of markets locally, regionally and internationally.

The association’s report stated that Jordan has the highest number of engineers in the world per-capita, with one engineer for every 39 citizens, approximately. 

The head of the organisation, Ahmed Al Zou’bi, said that the association took it upon itself to search for new markets locally, regionally and globally to provide training and employment opportunities for its members. Nevertheless, the huge increase in the number of graduates constitutes a great burden on the association. The global economic downturn has further contributed to these difficulties, he said.

He cautioned prospective university students to take the guidance bulletin into account when choosing engineering majors in order to avoid further market saturation and unemployment. He stated that some technical specialisations are still in demand, but should also be approached with caution. 

There are 58,332 engineers affiliated with the Civil Engineering Division and its sub-disciplines registered with the association. There are approximately 5,185 students currently studying this stream of engineering, all disciplines of which the report labelled “stagnant.” 

The association registered 17,630 engineers affiliated with the Architectural Engineering Division and 3,315 students in the discipline, which also remains in a “stagnant” state. 

Similarly, the market for mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and their sub-specialties are both “stagnant” and oversaturated, according to the report.  There are 39,914 mechanical engineers and 7,824 mechanical engineering students registered with the association. 

The total number of engineers affiliated with the Division of Mining,  Geological and Petroleum Engineering registered with the association reached 1,691, with 19 students in the field, which was also classified as “stagnant”. 

Every field of chemical engineering was also classified as “stagnant” with 9,771 chemical engineers and 2,245 chemical engineering students poised to enter the workforce. 

Economist Wajdi Makhamreh said that oversaturated disciplines, such as engineering and medicine, no longer have job opportunities and recommended that prospective students look to artificial intelligence, cyber security, hospitality and tourism services, which have better career opportunities.