Industrial needs v. Engineering education curricula related to maintenance, production and quality in industry 4.0: A gap analysis case study in Tunisia and Morocco

To improve the competitiveness of industry in Tunisia and Morocco, local authorities have adopted strategies to support industrial companies in modernizing their value-adding infrastructures. A sustained effort has been dedicated to encouraging industrial organizations to embrace the Industry 4.0 paradigm and technologies. Despite these continued efforts, engaging with Industry 4.0 is still difficult in countries like Tunisia and Morocco, particularly because industrial organizations struggle to find fresh graduates on the job market who are both skilled and qualified in Industry 4.0 operations. The contribution of this article is to initiate a process to better understand and assess the gap between industrial needs and academic offer with respect to Industry 4.0 skills and qualifications, considering the specificities of Tunisia and Morocco. We particularly focus on analyzing to what extent existing curricula in engineering education institutions satisfy or miss industrial needs and requirements in three core industrial business processes: maintenance, production, and quality (MPQ4.0). Therefore, a survey was conducted, from which a set of MPQ4.0 targeted skills and competencies were extracted and synthesized. Based on these skills and competencies, sample engineering education curricula are analyzed, gaps are identified, and recommendations for improvement are offered.