Three sector skills councils have secured more than £1m from the Welsh Assembly to deliver training for manufacturers in Wales.
Semta, the Sector Skills Council for Science, Engineering and Manufacturing Technologies, Cogent, the sector skills council for science based industries, and Proskills, the Sector Skills Council for the process and manufacturing sector, will use the money for the Sector Priorities Fund Programme – a scheme designed to help training providers work with businesses to build training programmes which deliver the actual skills required for practical applications.
Recent Semta research estimates that skills shortages across the country are costing more than £6.5million in lost productivity. The data also suggests that Welsh businesses in Semta’s sectors need almost 13,000 new recruits between now and 2016. Of these, 2,700 will be required to have higher level skills.
Philip Whiteman, Chief Executive of Semta said: “Semta’s role is to work with companies in our sectors to develop and implement training plans that ultimately improve bottom-line profitability. We’ve seen that businesses working with Semta’s National Skills Academy for Manufacturing achieve, on average, a 6:1 ratio of return on their investment, reinforcing to all companies the real value of skills development.
“However, as our research indicates, skills gaps and hard-to-fill vacancies in our sectors are still costing the Welsh economy millions of pounds, so there is still more work to be done. This funding will allow us to design and develop accredited programmes in line with the current requirements of manufacturing employers in Wales.”
It is expected that 80 businesses and 500 employees will benefit from the first cohort of activity.
Businesses interested in finding out more about the support and services from Semta can contact the organisation on 0845 643 9001 or [email protected]
