Skills ‘league table’ belies importance of food and drink

The head of the UK’s food and drink sector skills council has warned that the goal of raising the bar on workplace skills risks being jeopardised by ‘confusing political priorities with economic ones’ and urged employers to make their voices heard.

Responding to the publication of the government-commissioned National Strategic Skills Audit on Wednesday (March 17), Improve chief executive Jack Matthews said he was ‘concerned’ by what he described as the emphasis on ‘league tables’ of sectors ranked in priority order of economic importance.

The audit ranks 27 sectors on economic factors such as productivity, growth and employment at present and in the future, with food and drink manufacturing coming 20th and 22nd respectively. The report also rated sectors according to their present skills needs, with food and drink ranked seventh, and likely replacement demand for jobs in the future, in which food and drink occupies 19th place.

“I cannot understand this fascination with turning everything into a league table,” said Matthews. “We’ve had them in education, and now it seems we have them in workplace skills too. I always thought the ambition of raising the bar on skills in the workplace was universal across all sectors of industry and commerce, not about prioritising one over the other. This sends out completely the wrong message. It says to employers in the food and drink industry that the government does not rate you and as a consequence does not mind if, like a number of well known brands, you move overseas.

“Food and drink is the biggest manufacturing sector in the country and the only one experiencing sustained growth. It turns over £78.7 billion a year, the largest of all manufacturing sectors. It employs approximately 500,000 people, contributes 14 per cent of all manufacturing gross value added (GVA) and saw exports increase 26 per cent between 2006 and 2008. Nearly half of all retail purchases involve food, and yet we’re now officially being told we’re low priority.
“I can’t imagine employers, workers, trade organisations and stakeholders will be very pleased reading that their industry is rated in the bottom five sectors in terms of importance to the economy, and that despite having acknowledged skills needs, priorities should lie elsewhere. Where is the sense of reality?”

Mr Matthews said the audit’s use of a ranking system massively oversimplified the issues and risked diverting attention away from the fundamental goal of developing a robust, successful economy based on individuals’ talents and ambitions. “The key messages are all there in summary – we need more higher and intermediate skills in managerial, professional and technical roles to help businesses perform more efficiently, we need to match the supply of skills to the changing demands of the workplace, and we need to stimulate demand for better paid, higher-skilled job roles and ensure we are using the talent we have most effectively.

“There is a risk of those messages being lost. Anyone glancing at this audit would conclude all we need for future success is to invest in skills for financial and business services, education and health care, and retail. The economy is not going to thrive on better trained bankers, business consultants and shop assistants alone. We’ve just come through a recession where serious alarm bells were sounded about the UK’s reliance on business services and our lack of a production base, so instead of portraying our established manufacturing base as an insignificant afterthought, why are we not talking about ways we can use and develop the talents of our workforce to help reignite our industrial based economy?

“If we are to develop and adopt new low-impact production and processing methods, more environmentally friendly packaging and more sustainable, efficient transport solutions then the way we train and develop people to implement these new practices is going to be critical. The food and drink industry is already leading the sustainability agenda in key areas such as waste reduction and elimination. It needs to be supported and recognised, not downgraded.

“As an overview of current and future skills requirements, and a manifesto for ‘skills for jobs’, my concern is that this is government being seduced by league tables rather than working with sectors and employers to ensure we achieve this country’s ambitions for sustainable, robust growth.”

For further information, go to www.improve-skills.co.uk.