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Don’t ease up on apprenticeships, urges BIFA
[ February 11, 2021 // Chris ]As National Apprenticeship week comes nears its end, the British International Freight Association has repeated its call for freight forwarding and logistics companies to consider recruiting apprentices.
Executive director Carl Hobbis said: “We know it’s a tough call, with the pandemic and the post transition period continuing to disrupt many freight forwarders’ operations. There has been a sharp decline in the number of individuals that have started their journey on the International Freight Forwarding specialist apprenticeship.
“Forwarding businesses have many difficult commercial decisions to make, but shelving apprenticeships should not be one of them.”
“It is vital to continue to recruit freight forwarding apprentices and build capacity to start equipping a new generation with the knowledge and skills to face the challenges ahead in the post Brexit and post Covid-19 world.”
BIFA says that the fall in apprenticeships is not just a freight industry problem. Government statistics show a sharp decline in apprenticeship starts across the entire country. However, for the freight industry the issue is even more acute because of that huge upsurge in its workload both before and after the end of the Brexit transition period.
Hobbis says that the International Freight Forwarding specialist apprenticeship, which BIFA helped to create in 2018, is an ideal entry point for the industry with around 500 apprentices having taken the pathway already, with great success.
Funding is available as part of the government’s support scheme for training and apprenticeships. Until March 2021, to support employers to take on more apprentices, the government is offering up to £2,000 for each new apprentice they hire.
Tags: BIFA