Teesside to be UK skills centre
A NATIONAL Skills Academy for the Process Industries is to be based on Teesside, the Evening Gazette can reveal today.
The academy - needed to overcome major skills shortages in the process industry - will now become fully operational at Wilton after extensive planning.
David Lammy, Government Minister for Skills, was due to announce the news today.
The academy will provide new talent vital to the region’s process sector, which faces a shortage of 20,000 workers by 2014, according to a report by the North East Process Industry Cluster - NEPIC.
“The formation of a National Skills Academy for the Process Industries is fantastic news for the whole sector across the UK,” said Stan Higgins, chief executive of NEPIC.
The National Skills Academy will operate out of a hub based at Wilton, but will also have regional offices throughout the UK to ensure that specific training needs unique to each region are met.
It is an employer-led centre and has already received over £1m from more than 40 firms. The Learning and Skills Council and various regional development agencies will also make financial contributions.
Regional development agency One NorthEast is supporting the National Skills Academy Process Industries with £1.3m of funding over three years.
National Skills Academy Process Industries project director Craig Crowther, said: “We are delighted we are able to move forward as an official Skills Academy after all the hard work from our team and support we have received from businesses throughout 2007.
“We can enter 2008 working side by side with employers and training providers throughout the UK to address the skills needs of the process industries.”
He added the academy would provide the skilled workforce needed in the region’s process sector to continue to compete on a global scale and meet the demands of new technology and changing work practices.
The Skills Academy will be holding an official launch event in London early next year where key objectives will be announced. Regional events will follow.
The academy is the second of four planned to go live this year. The Nuclear Skills Academy has already been launched. Creative and cultural and hospitality academies will follow.
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