While the current skills shortage in the mining and manufacturing industries has been well-documented, labour shortages in the rural sector are reaching crisis point.
While the current skills shortage in the mining and manufacturing industries has been well-documented, labour shortages in the rural sector are reaching crisis point.
The drought has reduced demand in some areas for workers in seasonal jobs, such as seeding and harvesting, but permanent skilled labour has been difficult to source.
Those within the sector say the solution lies in a combination of training, advertising and immigration strategies.
Rural employment agency Rural Enterprises director Tom Wilson says the current skills shortage is part of a global trend and the cost in lost revenue to farmers is difficult to quantify, although the shortage is general and critical.
“We’re losing the skill base as a direct result of a combination of widespread drought and the massive uptake of skilled agricultural workers by other thriving industries, such as mining and construction,” he said.
“We have many clients who, at this moment in time, are looking to expand their business and have the wherewithal and ability to expand, but find that this is not feasible because of the shortage of experienced farm staff.”
“In the last 15 months, the situation has become quite serious and we have had to implement massive advertising campaigns, first off in Australia, to target the local sector.”
Mr Wilson said that a lack of response locally had necessitated an international campaign.
“The results we were getting were minimal, so we then had to move our target area to other countries, including New Zealand and the UK, who have a modern and well trained farm workforce.”
Mr Wilson said that while farming bodies and government agencies were trying various initiatives to solve the problem, further training and immigration in the short term needed to be considered.
On July 1 this year, the federal government introduced a second working holiday maker visa for people aged 18 to 30 years, open to those who spend three months doing seasonal work in regional areas on their initial visa.
About 5000 visas have been granted to date, although the nature of the work undertaken by visa recipients is predominantly unskilled, such as picking and tree felling.
PGA Personnel employment manager Milan Zaklan said training, rather than overseas recruitment or advertising, must be a priority.
“We advertise nationwide, so as far as the profile goes, I don’t really think personally that it’s a shortage of advertising,” he said.
“I do know that in the last six months, there’s been a lot more [farmers] prepared to take people with different skills and prepared to spend time in training.”
However, WA Primary Industries Training Council Inc rural production division vice chair Fred Chambers said training alone was not sufficient to relieve the shortage.
“It’s a valid thing to say we need to train more people, but attracting potential trainees is just as difficult as attracting skilled people.”
Mr Chambers said agricultural colleges were a good source of young people and equipped their graduates with important skills, although there was a limit to the extent to which this could alleviate the problem.
He said that of the 217 agricultural college graduates in 2005, 121 graduates were employed in agriculture or agriculture-related areas, with 41 of these returning to their home farms.
“It’s a highly competitive labour market," he said.
"Only a certain portion of the population is going to be interested in agriculture, but we have to try and market what we do have.”
“We’re not able to market them effectively enough at this point in time, but I think the opportunities are there at various points in a person’s life. We have to get smarter about how we disseminate this information.”
