A major skills shortage is continuing to dampen growth prospects in Scotland’s engineering sector, an industry leader has claimed.
Bryan Buchan took over as the chief executive of industry body Scottish Engineering (SE) in January and said his initial round of appointments with members had left him struck by the scale of the skills gap which continued to dog the sector.
“It has been brought home to me that the skills shortages within our industry are very real indeed,” Mr Buchan warned.
“Throughout the country there are unfulfilled vacancies for engineers in various skills, from machine operators to design engineers.
“Scottish Engineering is initiating a range of activities, in conjunction with other similar organisations, to actively address this major inhibitor to our growth.”
Mr Buchan was speaking as SE released its latest quarterly review into the health of the engineering sector in Scotland.
The new figures show new order intakes fell significantly to -10 in the current quarter from a positive return in the three months to December.
The result means levels of new business have been in negative territory for nine months out of the last 18.
The figures also show a dip in output volumes in the latest period the first time there has been a dip since March 2010 while exporting continued to struggle after recording an 11-point downturn.
The last time overseas trade rose for the industry was in June 2011.
The survey found the worst performing sectors in the period were general fabrication and metal manufacturing, both of which have now been on negative outlook for a number of quarters.
The SE survey did find growth in the staffing sector albeit muted to continue an upwards trend which started in mid 2010, and there was a slight increase in prices that firms were able to command in the last quarter.
Capital and training investment remained healthy in the quarter while overall the respondents were marginally more upbeat about the outlook for the industry than they were at the end of the last quarter.
Mr Buchan said: “While it is apparent that order intake has softened, optimism remains positive as do forecasts for the next three months in terms of trading outlook.”
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