What are the issues that the UK environmental sciences sector will be working on in the future? What skills will be needed to help address these issues? What training might still be needed to equip people better to deal with the challenges ahead?
These are some of the questions being addressed by ERFF members and other stakeholders involved in the Skills Needs Review being led by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).
The Review report is due to be published in May 2010 and will then be available online to inform training strategies across the UK.
The focus has been on identifying the postgraduate skills needs of:
- the environmental sciences research sector;
- the public sector;
- industry and business.
So far over 600 people have contributed their expertise to a public consultation and we are very grateful to them for the time and care they have taken. Since then a thorough analysis of the responses together with a review of existing postgraduate training strategy and provision in the UK has been carried out to help determine where there is a mismatch between skills needs and training provision.
NERC will be using the conclusions to inform their next training strategy to help ensure that there are people with the right mix of skills and knowledge available to employers in the future.
Further information on the project is on the NERC website 
. If you have any queries contact Jo Tudor or Chris Smith.