13 April 2007

Primary industries must work harder to attract the next generation

Agriculture Minister Jim Anderton said today the future of New Zealand’s primary industries was going to depend on attracting young people to a rural lifestyle.

“It is not going to be easy for us to attract skills to agriculture. We are  thankfully  in a time of low unemployment. In fact new figures show the jobless rate is lower than it's been for twenty-seven years. I am very proud of that achievement under this government. But I also know it poses a challenge to this industry to attract skilled young people at a time when they face choices. As the population ages  and as overseas countries enter intense competition for skilled people, too  the demand for skills will increase.”

Jim Anderton said that the primary industries themselves had an important role to play by being good employers. “They haven't always had the best reputation. There are some positive initiatives under way. The ‘Go Dairy’ campaign on tv is one example. If we want to attract skills, the industry will have to be seen as well-paid, enjoying an attractive lifestyle and offering career development.”

He was speaking at the Horticulture Agriculture Teachers Association Conference at Lincoln University and talked of New Zealand’s dependence on land-based industries to deliver a first world standard of living.

“Agricultural and horticultural exports comprise two thirds of our overseas earnings. Our forests, our dairy, our wool, our meat and our fruit  and countless processed products derived from our primary industries  are the backbone of our economy.

“You are on the front line of the challenge we face,” Jim Anderton said to the agriculture and horticulture teachers at the conference. “You have a critical central role in our ability as a country to recruit, retain and develop the skills we need to maximise the potential of our primary industries.”

He went on to talk about how attitudes towards science and its potential for exciting careers are first shaped in the schools. “There was a time when attitudes towards research and science in our primary industries were poor. I think we still have a bit of a hangover from those days in some attitudes towards agricultural science today.

“There has been a generation of under-investment in skills and training in agriculture and the chickens are coming home to roost. The government is doing a lot. For example, we have taken great strides to resuscitate skills training with the Modern Apprenticeship Scheme and industry training programmes. But in addition to training, we need to promote the attractions of the rural lifestyle and the varied, inteesting and well-rewarded career oportunities,” Jim Anderton said.

ENDS

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