UK food industry employment sees strong growth
The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) has found that employment in the food industry continued to rise in Q1 2022, with the industry gaining 7,000 jobs since the previous quarter and 16,000 on the year, reaching 475,000.
The report, which based its findings on figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), found that the food and drink industry added jobs at a faster pace than the economy as a whole: quarter-on-quarter, job growth stood at 1.5%, above the UK’s growth of 0.8%.
Year-on-year, the industry saw a rise of 3.5% in the number of jobs, a more rapid acceleration than the UK’s overall figure of 2.7%.
Despite the record growth, the FDF report stressed that the current environment “remains very challenging” and that “labour shortages persist and are severe.” FDF members report that they had 5.2 unfilled vacancies per 100 employees in Q1 2022, above the average in the UK as a whole of 4.1 vacancies per 100 employees.
FDF also said that the war in Ukraine had produced a “new wave of production cost rises”, from higher prices of food ingredients and packaging to energy.
CEO of the organisation Karen Betts said that the rise in the number of people employed in the food and drink industry was positive, however the industry still faces “significant and stubborn labour shortages, across a variety of roles, from warehouse operators to engineers.”
She said: “These shortages, which are forcing some companies to suspend some production, are hampering growth and contributing to rising costs. Many businesses are looking to invest more in advanced technologies as a result, but the uncertain economic outlook and the range of upcoming, complex government regulation is holding them back.”
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