NEW Zealand is also facing skills shortage problems in teaching, medical, engineering and other technical areas, says Business New Zealand Employment Relations manager Paul MacKay.
Mr McKay was responding to a question posed by Narsey’s Plastics Industries Ltd managing director Vinay Narsey during the Top Executive (TOPEX) Conference at the Sofitel Fiji Resort and Spa about New Zealand’s immigration and labour policies.
He said New Zealand was losing most of its skilled workers to Australia.
“We have skills shortages,” he said.
“If I go back one step, we’ve just released this report last week, which basically says by 2050, we’re going to be short of about 250,000 workers, so we have a skills shortage anyway in New Zealand.
“We’re growing a lot more lawyers and people like that at home, but we aren’t developing basic skills and it’s not about agricultural work, because we’ll always find enough people to do that.”
In the digital age of Artificial Intelligence, Mr MacKay said, real technical skills are key for most employers.
“Other than the RSE (recognised seasonal employers) program, out of about 20,000 workers, only about 1000 come from Fiji.
“Most of them are going into government, into telecom or to the health sector, and some into teaching.”
Mr MacKay said regional mobility needed to be explored.
