FDF Apprenticeship Pledge
The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) is calling on all UK food and drink manufacturers to sign up to our apprenticeship pledge.
Apprenticeships are a fantastic way of attracting talent for the future and
bring many benefits to businesses including increased productivity, improved
competitiveness and a motivated workforce.
By recruiting new apprentices and upskilling your existing employees, you are
ensuring that your business has the right skills now and in the future.
What is FDF's pledge about?
FDF is pledging to double the number of apprenticeships available in the food
and drink manufacturing sector in England and Scotland by the end of 2012.
We are calling on food and drink manufacturers to sign up to our pledge and
contribute in anyway they can – whether it is offering 10 or 100
apprenticeships –
which will collectively help us reach our goal.
Our pledge will also contribute towards Feed Your Ambition: Skills Action Plan for the UK Food Supply Chain (pdf, 1.11Mb), launched earlier this year, which announced an
industry commitment to create 50,000 apprenticeship training opportunities
throughout the UK food supply chain, from farming to manufacturing to retail.
How can employers – both FDF and non-members – sign up?
1. Contact the National Skills Academy for food and drink (NSA) on 0845 644 0558
where your enquiry will be recorded including details such as company size;
sub-sector e.g. meat, chilled, confectionary; and how many apprenticeships you
wish
to offer etc.
2. Your enquiry will be forwarded onto a trained NSA skills consultant who will
visit you in person to discuss the options available to you e.g. delivery
in-house or through an external training provider. If your company employs more
than
250 people, the National Apprenticeship Service will accompany the NSA on a joint visit.
3. Based on an assessment of your business' needs, the NSA will then approach
training providers on your behalf and source the right one for you.
4. Proposals from the best training providers will be collated and sent to you
for approval.
What are the benefits to employers in signing up to an industry pledge?
Apprenticeships are Government-backed, work-based training programmes
specifically tailored to meet the skills needs of employers. By FDF working in
partnership
with the National Skills Academy for food and drink and the National
Apprenticeship Service, you can benefit from:
- reduced administrative burden as you are supported through the process of
developing and implementing an apprenticeship programme;
- optimised funding stream ensuring you have access to the maximum available funding enabling you to
upskill your workforce at all ages and levels[1];
- high quality training providers that have been hand-picked to meet your needs;
- central measurement undertaken which will provide us with credibility as we
celebrate our success and launch a PR campaign.
- free service to advertise your apprenticeship vacancies through the National Apprenticeship Service website
Why are we pledging to double?
We will need to replace 30% of our current workforce by 2017 due to employees
entering retirement or leaving the industry.
Our sector is currently relying on an ageing workforce to support growth and we
do not currently have a sufficient pipeline of young people that could
potentially be engineers, team leaders or managers for the future. Furthermore,
we have
fewer apprenticeships compared to our food chain partners - with approximately
12,000 alone in the food and drink retail sector.
Food and drink manufacturers can act now by collectively pledging to double the
number of apprenticeships from approximately 1700 to 3400. This collective
action will help us build a pool of talented apprentices that can be developed
and
deployed across the UK food and drink manufacturing industry – building skills
for
the future. Apprenticeships will also be an important tool to 'grow our own' as
we seek to become less reliant on migrant workers (who represent 20% of our
workforce).
Greater demand for apprenticeships is also expected due to rising tuition fees
in higher education. Apprenticeships are likely to become a sought after option
for young people given that they can earn as they learn rather than getting
themselves into huge debt by going to university. As a result, more
apprenticeships
will need to be available to meet this demand.
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Notes:
[1] The Government fully funds apprenticeships for 16-18 year olds and provides
50% co-funding for 19 years of age and over. For ages 25 and over, the funding
is reduced to 40%. Please note that government funding goes directly to
training
providers.
More Information
Last reviewed: 24 Jan 2012