The Sgiliau Bwyd a Diod Cymru | Food & Drink Skills Wales programme, recently called upon ambassadors of the food and drink industry to form a specific Expert Group to identify skills gaps and opportunities within the industry.
The main aim of the Expert Group was to identify the critical skills gaps that exist within the food and drink manufacturing industry in Wales. This would draw upon the group’s unrivalled knowledge to understand and summarise the causes in strategic areas, and identify broad programmes to help address these gaps, by prioritising them into a plan.
Three meetings were held across Wales providing an opportunity for representatives to engage in discussions and to ensure that the programme effectively contributes solutions in support of the Welsh Government’s Vision for a strong and vibrant Welsh Food and Drink Industry.
Findings from an Employee Engagement Survey carried out by WorkL were shared by Sophie Colquhoun of Category Insight and issues identified within the report were also taken into consideration. This is in addition to two independent research reports recently commissioned by the programme, which specifically looked into skills gaps and future industry needs.
Chaired by Neil Burchell, experienced Mentor and Director of The Welsh Whisky Company; the Expert Group identified the main areas of which the Food & Drink Skills Wales programme could contribute towards and address.
One area of key concern for the industry raised was the lack of engineers and following discussions in the meeting and suggestions of how to tackle this, immediate action was taken and a partnership with the Employment Liaison Team at Neath Port Talbot Council who are challenged with finding new positions for the Tata Steel workforce following redundancies, was formed.
Kate Rees, Sgiliau Bwyd a Diod Cymru | Food & Drink Skills Wales Project Manager said:
“The discussions at all three meetings were extremely valuable to us. It means that we can plan ahead using evidence and first-hand knowledge of the current situation in terms of skills gaps within the industry and work towards addressing them as a programme.”
Attendees across all three meetings included representatives from Food Centre Wales, Wickedly Welsh, Zero2Five, Capestone Organic, Penderyn, Category Insight,Terry’s Patisserie, Food Technology Centre, South Caernarfon Creameries, Hilltop Honey, In the Welsh Wind Distillery and Total Food Marketing representing a variety of business functions including senior leadership, commercial, HR, finance and production.
Rob Cumine, Capestone Organic who was at the inception meeting said:
“The Expert Group has provided a great opportunity for us as a company to contribute our own findings to the wider discussions and share some of the challenges we face as an industry. I’m looking forward to seeing the published plan of how to deliver a series of programmes to meet Welsh Governments’ objectives and ultimately contribute to a prosperous future for food and drink production and manufacturing here in Wales.”