Research confirms lack of skilled manpower, a drag on textiles & footwear industry

01 Sep '05

1 min read

Results of a research conducted by the Sector Skill Counicl announced recently, indicate that clothing, footwear and textile sectors were experiencing skilled manpower shortages.

While industry has moved from low volume to high value, the research is a pointer of the sort for the country's industires that are on the move.

Research indicated that 81 percent of Welsh cited a shortage of potential recruits with the appropriate skills, qualifications or experience even as the textiles and footwear industries with growing productivity contributes almost £11.6 billion to the UK economy each year.

This figure compares much above the national average of 69 pecent clearly establishing shortages in skilled manpower in Wales.

Besides, lack of skilled workers was dissuading employers from developing new products, informed more than a fifth of the persons covered under the survey.

Employers expressed their willingness to release more employees for getting trained in computers and software.

A Skills Council spokesperson pointed out eventhough employers favour training, but accessibility was a major issue according to their research.

UK based Skillfast said such changes indicate employees ought to be more flexible and technically skilled today that has resulted in the current 'skill crisis.'

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