RADI Centre To Help Propel Wood Manufacturing Into High Value Exports

Launch of Radi centre helps propel wood manufacturing towards high value exports and more jobs

Training, skills development and research done at the Radi Centre is an essential element of the Labour Progressive coalition government's Wood Processing Strategy to propel New Zealand's timber industry towards high value exports and more jobs.

Design and innovation in manufacturing are crucial to improving our economic performance. The skills and research, which people develop at the RADI centre will not only contribute to upskilling the wood industry workforce, but also to developing high value manufactured products through new technology and new ideas.

A Designwood think tank is planned for the centre, which will investigate how to creatively develop the products we manufacture from raw timber. We must add as much value as possible in New Zealand to produce the high value added exports we need to sustain, strengthen and expand the timber industry creating more high skill jobs.

Wood processing could become our most valuable industry in fifteen years but in order to grow the industry, we are dependent on more innovative products being developed. The RADI centre is key to helping us do just that.

See Jim Anderton's speech at: http://www.progressive.org.nz/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=637

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