A lack of skills have led to some companies casting international recruitment to fulfill their tradesmen shortages.
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Hutcheon and Pearce, retailers for John Deere Tractors, are still inconvenienced by the lack of skills and are struggling to employ skilled tradesmen.
In the last three years, HP have sponsored South Africans, Filipinos and Welshmen through visa programs to fill the gaps in the agricultural workforce.
Wagga HP Matt Duffy said this international recruitment in which they are trained and sent to TAFE in Wagga, was just one avenue to address the shortage.
“This involves training from the ground up and we’ve found that a lot of people can be standard mechanics, but with the high-tech machines these days, teaching in diagnostics is important,” he said.
Educational institutions are trying to meet the challenge to up-skill the workforce, with TAFE NSW delivering training to local businesses.
HP together with TAFE developed a program four years ago, where all HP apprentices from all over Australia come to the TAFE NSW primary industries centre in North Wagga for a couple of weeks a year.
The apprentices get trained on the newest machinery and then test it on the 140-acre working farm at TAFE NSW.
They came to an agreement that HP would put on a minimum of 12 apprentices a year to keep the TAFE class, which trains and learns on John Deere equipment.
“Our first year of the program are half-way through their third year now and so when they are finished with their apprenticeships, there will be 15-16 skilled tradesmen,” Mr Duffy said.
“In all truth, we are still struggling but it’s got a lot better.”
Andrew Haenig came to John Deere with a certificate four in agriculture traineeship to do some mechanical work and then he moved into tractor parts.
“I chose this course to help the farmers out and get a better knowledge towards the agriculture industry,” he said.
The TAFE Enterprise, plans to address the government skills gap with a new platform that will sell corporate training to the private sector and government, which is estimated at a $9.2 billion market.
The managing director Jon Black, said the professional training market is constantly changing.
“What we know for a fact is that big business, and presumably government too, is scared stiff about how it’s going to deal with major skills gaps, which are coming in fast,” Mr Black said.
“This is a business model that successfully works with employers to identify gaps in their workforce, and collaborates to design bespoke training solutions, specifically-customised to the individual circumstances of the business.”
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