The Academy for Sustainable Communities is warning that – if current housing trends do continue – there are likely to be significant labour shortages among building professionals within five years.

The study, Mind the Skills Gap: A Review of the Skills We Need for Sustainable Communities, carried out by Arup, says a wide range of organisations surveyed expect widespread shortages. Generic skills also need improvement.

The study is based on continuation of the present growth trends in housing etc, which begs various questions, but says if it continues across the next five years the UK could end up with a 91% shortage of architects, urban designers and landscape architects, 74% sustainable development experts, 73% regeneration professionals and 46% planners. Things are not so bad among developers (17%), engineers (17%), transport planners (11%) and surveyors (6%).

“As ambitions grow and new challenges emerge we need even more people with
the right skills to deal with the complexities of delivering sustainable communities,”
said ASC chair Peter Roberts. “We need to foster more of a team approach and give people transferable skills so they can contribute to different types of community projects.”

The report says significant progress has been made in tackling shortages but more will be needed as labour shortages and skills gaps are widening. Further research will be required, as will multi-disciplinary working and generic skills.

 http://www.ascskills.org.uk/download/General/research/mind_the_skills_gap_summary.pdf