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Background

As part of the FarmBis Targeted Industry Initiative (TII) the partnership of Tasmanian Country Women’s Association, Tasmanian Women in Agriculture and Rural Youth Organisation of Tasmania (hereafter known as the partnership), was granted funds to undertake the 15 – 25 Year Old Future Farmer Study to identify strategies to increase participation of the 15 – 25 year age bracket in rural industries training. It is a commonly held belief that the number of young people across Australia, particularly those between 18 and 30 years of age, entering the agricultural sectors is falling. Training is seen as vital to ensuring rural and agricultural industry profitability and competitive advantage. However, for training to remain required and relevant, there must be young people with an interest and willingness to undertake training and / or seek work across Tasmania’s agricultural sectors. The partnership identified the need to further consult with young people in rural areas to attract, train and retain them in Tasmania’s rural and agricultural sectors and therefore regional communities. Given the importance of the future rural and agricultural sectors for Tasmania, there are compelling economic and social reasons to address the attraction and retention of young people in the rural sector.


Analysis of Results / Key Observations / Recommendations

Results from the RuralFutures Survey and the nine Focus Groups have been reviewed for common themes, similarities and differences. From this, the following key themes have been identified. These themes represent the key findings of this RuralFutures research and are the drivers of the recommendations.


1. Access to Current and Future Training Information

With 54% of respondents indicating they have not or don’t know if they have received training information in the last year, access to current training information and its penetration into the young rural market must be questioned. Of those that have received training information, Careers Expos closely followed by Brochures and then Newspapers and Direct Mail were the most popular ways that young people received training information. Given that Careers Expos are likely to be held in the more populated regional centres, this may mean that young people in more rural and remote regions of Tasmania have less access to current training information. In terms of where training information is received, 54% of respondents stated from their School and Careers Counsellors followed by Training Organisations. This highlights that the education sector and in particular Careers Counsellors are the best avenues for promotion of job and training opportunities in the Tasmanian rural and agricultural sectors. Of concern is that 60% of respondents indicate that they don’t know or they don’t know if they know where to access information about further training opportunities from. It is likely that this percentage increases once young people leave school as without access to school careers counsellors it is clear that young people are not aware of where they can access further training opportunities. With 53% of respondents stating they are interested in further training, one can surmise that some of these young people will miss this opportunity as they do not know where to access information about further training. There is a need to support and link young people who have left the education system with training providers.

Recommendation 1
Promote where young people can gain information about rural and agricultural career pathways to young people across all regions of Tasmania.

Recommendation 2
Provide transport support for young people to attend Careers Expos, where they are held outside of regional centres.

Recommendation 3
Ensure that Careers Expos provide contemporary career pathways and case studies of jobs in rural and agriculture sectors across Tasmania.


2. Interest in Further Training

With 53% of respondents indicating they are interested in further training or attending a future training course, there is a strong need to ensure there are streamlined and easy access points for these young people to gain information and understand their future training options. Results of this survey indicate that this is not currently the case. This is especially so for those who have left school. A training brokerage process where an independent individual or group actively matches a person’s needs to appropriate training may be an option – especially for those young people who are no longer in the school system. 28% of respondents stated they don’t know if they are interested in further training or attending a future training course. It could be suggested that if young people were provided with information of relevance to this target group then a decision could be more easily reached and this percentage may be decreased resulting in more young people being interested in accessing further training. Training courses are the preferred mode for further training followed by Apprenticeships and Workplace Training and Group Training. Given the current popularity surrounding mentoring, only 1% of respondents who are interested in further training indicated this as their preferred mode of training.

Recommendation 4
Investigate a training brokerage model / program to provide further training information to young people in rural and regional Tasmania and link young people with training opportunities, especially those who have left the education system.


3. Training Courses of Interest

 The results of this research indicate a demand for further training in agriculture in the majority of regions across Tasmania. Just over a half of the respondents who indicated an interest in further training or attending a training course want training in agriculture or agriculture related areas. In terms of regions, those with the least demand for training in this area are the west and east coasts of Tasmania. Those with the greatest demand are southern Tasmania, central Tasmania, northern Tasmania and other. Gaining specific details of programs that respondents would like to access that aren’t available in their area has revealed little outcome of quantifiable value. 48% stated they don’t know if they would like training that is not available in their area. This raises the question of whether young people actually know what training is available to them in their area and supports the notion that the accessibility of training information for young people is not clear.

Recommendation 5
Continue to support training providers to provide rural and agricultural training programs across all areas of rural and regional Tasmania.

Recommendation 6
Investigate marketing avenues to ensure that training programs are more effectively promoted to young people in rural and regional areas across Tasmania.


4. Career Pathways in Agriculture

A recurring theme from the Focus Group side of this research indicates that career pathways in agriculture are not clearly articulated to young people and are in fact caught in a cultural stereotype where jobs in agriculture are believed to be ‘dead end’, ‘hard work’, ‘not well paid’ and ‘lead nowhere’. This coupled with the fact that there appears to be very few information products (such as brochures and case studies etc) available to show the rural business and career opportunities that do in fact exist means that careers counsellors, youth officers and schools, who are the major providers of career information, may lack the necessary knowledge of the agricultural industry and information required to promote career pathways in agriculture. This indicates that there is a role for the agricultural industry to develop and / or contribute to career pathway materials that promote the changed face of agriculture in Tasmania and work more closely with the education sector to ensure contemporary career pathways are proactively promoted from Year 8 onwards. Currently there appears a gap as career opportunities are mainly promoted from Year 10 and this has little value for those who may have left or disengaged from the education system earlier.

Recommendation 7
Proactively promote exposure to the rural and agricultural sectors through familiarisation activities such as school based excursions and exchanges etc from Year 8 onwards.

Recommendation 8
Develop career pathway information to promote careers in the rural and agricultural sectors. Ensure this information defines rural and agriculture and the breadth of career opportunities and the knowledge and skills sets of the jobs available.

Recommendation 9
Support industry to promote the changed face of agriculture and the breadth of rural and agricultural career opportunities available.

Recommendation 10
Support industry to develop a Changed Face of Agriculture Career Pathways campaign through the development of information, case studies etc and the active promotion of these to young people as well as school based careers counsellors, pathway planners, training organisations and youth officers.


5. Future Work Location and Industry Sector

With 42% of respondents indicating they intend to work in rural or regional Tasmania in the future, there is a reasonably strong commitment by young people to remaining in the regional areas of Tasmania. With 54% indicating they intend to work in the city, other parts of Australia or overseas, there is a need for consideration to be given to the active promotion of the benefits of working in rural and regional Tasmania. It is obvious from this research that there are more compelling reasons for young people to leave rather than stay and work in rural and regional Tasmania. From Focus Group research as part of this study, the main reasons identified by young people as to why they choose not to work in rural Tasmania include social isolation, lack of services / entertainment, too much hard work, not enough pay, no clear career pathways and no knowledge of what opportunities are out there – lack of information dispersed at high school.

A focus on clearly articulating the changed face of agriculture and more specifically contemporary rural business focussed career pathways and opportunities may see some young people who intend to work in the city, other parts of Australia or overseas reconsider the benefits of working in rural and regional Tasmania. However, from this research, it appears that promoting the opportunities available will only go so far. There are other complex cultural issues at play here including social isolation and a lack of services / entertainment for young people and a solution which results in the rural and regional areas of Tasmania as being seen as having the same opportunities as city centres may be the only solution that would see some young people choose to remain or work in rural or regional areas of Tasmania.

Of the 368 respondents who indicated the future industry they intend to work in, the highest sector, with 12%, is agriculture or agriculture related areas. Although this is the highest sector indicated, comparatively 12% is not a high percentage. Therefore, this too points to the need for the development of career pathways materials and a proactive campaign to promote agriculture as a career pathway.

Recommendation 11
Ensure that the benefits of living and working in rural and regional Tasmania as well as those for young people who work in the rural and agricultural sectors are clearly articulated as a key component of the Changed Face of Agriculture Career Pathways campaign.
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