The first two Centres for Training and Integration (CTIs) are from the service and hospitality sector, with Holiday Inn and Eureka Call Centre Systems hoping to train at least 150 workers by 2013.

Special education schools and voluntary welfare organisations provide the bulk of the trainees, who are sent to these institutes to pick up vocational skills such as housekeeping and call centre operation over six months.

The first of their kind, these institutes were spearheaded by the Enabling Employers Network, an alliance of companies set up in 2008 to promote the hiring of disabled Singaporeans.

Member companies, which include the training institutes as well as employers in service sectors like Pizza Hut and Secret Recipe Cafe, currently have 74 disabled Singaporeans on their payroll.

By next year, as many as 22 more people are expected to graduate from the institutes with jobs available for them in companies that promise to pay them fairly, if not as well as ordinary employees.

Minister for Manpower Gan Kim Yong said the pioneer companies from the hospitality and call centre industries have great potential to boost employment chances for the disabled.

'This will enable more of them to not only contribute to the economy, but also attain self-reliance through employment and integrate more fully into society,' he said, speaking at the the launch of the centres in Holiday Inn Orchard City Centre.

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