"The worst thing that could happen to us as a nation is the discovery of natural gas, and heaven forbid – the discovery of oil. It will divert our attention from investing in technological education", outgoing Intel Israel CEO Maxine Fassberg said Tuesday at the Israel Association of Electronics and Software Industries' conference in Tel Aviv, Calcalist reported.
Addressing Israel's education system, Fassberg said: "We have to bring the industry back home. The waves of immigration from the forever Soviet Union which have tremendously boosted Israel's high-tech industry, subsided and cannot offer the bonus they did in their early years.
"Therefore, Israel must outline a national education plan for the next 25 years and not just for one or two years ahead, which will be comprehensive, and address the needs of Israel's industry as a productive sector which will foster the next generation."
Fassberg cautioned that Israel suffered from the lack of engineers and that the quality of engineers currently graduating from universities in the country was lacking due to the fact that universities emphasized quantity rather than quality.