Agricultural Careers - what could you do in agriculture?
Did you know employers like Lloyds, Santander, McDonald’s, Waitrose and Tesco all have career opportunities for staff with agricultural knowledge and qualifications? This article will hopefully show that it’s not all about flat caps and driving muck spreaders. The following statistics, taken from a report by Lantra in 2014, demonstrate that these industries have the potential to be excellent places to build a career. There will be:
An additional 148,000 new jobs between 20114 and 2020
Another 447,000 jobs available over this time period due to people leaving agriculture because of retirement
The numbers employed, and the number of organisations in agriculture has been increasing in recent years: 97,400 agriculture sector establishments in 2015
402,500 agriculture sector employees in 2015
3rd biggest sector in percentage growth of employment
1 in 3 skilled trades and 1 in 3 machine operatives’ jobs unfilled due to skills shortages. Not all of these 402,500 employees will be farmers or tractor drivers. There are a huge variety of job roles and employers in each part of the ‘farm to fork’ process, with a very diverse range of organisations to work for. The following job roles demonstrate the range available within the agriculture sector, from those directly involved with farming, to many others:
Farm manager – arable, mixed, animal
Agronomist – soil science
Nutritionist
Land surveyor
Agricultural land officer
Contractors – e.g. spraying, harvesting, artificial insemination
Farm advisers/consultants
Tractor/technology consultants
Plant and animal breed advisers
Agricultural engineers
Journalists/PR consultants
Agricultural marketing
Research scientists
Policy advisers
Logistics managers
Sales – everything from seeds, breeds, equipment and poly tunnels!
Finance and business related
Agricultural economist and related e.g. grain broker
Commercial horticulturalist.
As you can see, there is a range of roles, all needing very different skills and qualifications. So, not only are there positions for students who want an outdoorsy type job and who like working with animals or plants, but there are varied opportunities for students who are interested in science and engineering too. In fact, tractors are becoming more and more high tech, with satellite systems enabling more targeted use of sprays etc.
This is a copy of an article I wrote for The CDI’s quarterly magazine, Career Matters, aimed at careers professionals. I hope you find it useful!
Lots of science related jobs in this area too!
For those students who are very good at science, plant and animal breeding can offer opportunities to do research into animal science, genetics and plant science to help address world productivity, animal welfare or science issues too. For students who are interested in business and farming, but may not want to do hands-on farming work, roles like farm secretary (where there is a shortage, and can be done as a self-employed option), or finance companies with opportunities for accountants, insurance work or bank relationship managers might appeal. These roles will need people who understand agriculture, something that the ICAEW recognise with their Farming and Rural Group, which aims to keep accountants up-to-date on farming issues. The Supply Chain has its own specific roles. There will be some overlap in roles between farmers, suppliers and the Animal and Plant Health Authority (APHA). For instance some quality assurance and inspection roles will be undertaken by suppliers, supermarkets and APHA to work with farmers to ensure quality and consistency whilst preventing any potential food scare stories!
Retail and supermarkets – agriculture/produce managers, specialisms in pig, poultry, fish, beef/lamb, veg• Suppliers/processors – these will either be cooperatives, like Arla, or organisations like 2 Sisters and ABP Food Group. These organisations will have a range of career opportunities that reflect the business of buying produce directly from farmers, which is of course then turned into products to sell. These are just some of the possible roles for these companies:
Quality assurance roles - working with farmers to ensure animal welfare, ethics and production values are met
Contracts management with supermarkets and other clients
New product development staff who will be developing, testing and producing new products to sell
Packaging technologists - there is increasing attention being paid to packaging, to ensure food is kept as fresh as possible, to extend shelf life, whilst increasing its ‘attractiveness’ to consumers
Process Development Technologists – provide the ‘link’ between production teams and new development teams. This will involve collecting data from factory trials and needs a good understanding of food science and manufacturing.
Supply chain analysts
Engineering.
Apart from working in farming and the supply chain, there are also other opportunities that students can look at. The following are some that are worth highlighting:
DEFRA manage the Animal and Plant Health Authority to ‘safeguard animal and plant health for the benefit of people, the environment and the economy’ (APHA website). A definite destination for several research scientists and vets who want to work with animals or plants.
World Bank opportunities – to help increase productivity, food security, community development
European Union/European Commission – agriculture is seen as very important, there are several roles, ranging from policy, rural development and farm support
Journalism, PR and communications – farming may not be the first sector that comes to mind for these types of roles but there are several opportunities to do this type of work. And you could end up being one of the agricultural advisers for The Archers!
As with any industry, the size of organisations to work for in farming and the supply chain vary considerably. Companies like Bidwells and Strutt and Parker who manage farms and offer agronomy/consultancy support amongst other services are big, well established companies. At the other end of the scale, there will be some farms where it is just the farmer who takes a salary from the business. Throw in the option of farming organically, or with rare breeds alongside the option of ‘mass production’ farms and students face a varied choice of the type of farming they could do and the size of organisation to work with, some of whom have production units all over the world. Getting in Entry requirements and routes into these roles are numerous. For farming, there are several routes in, apprenticeships, FE courses and agriculture/agronomy degree courses. These degrees will sometimes have work placement years too. There is plenty of careers information available online, some websites are listed below. No article about career opportunities would be complete without reference to salary expectations. There are some that think that farming incomes are all low and insecure. Whilst there is some truth in this, e.g. for some sheep farmers at the moment, most of these other jobs mentioned can earn considerably above the national average wage, and in some cases double!
These websites will provide further information about routes in, salaries and more information,
Lantra information about careers
LInking Education and Farming (LEAF)
Institute of Agricultural Secretaries and Administrators
Animal and Health Plant Authority
Delacy Executive Recruitment Recruitment agency specialising in agriculure
NAAC amenity and agricultural contractors.
And lastly, did you know that the Bee Farmers Association have launched an apprenticeship in Bee Keeping? There are currently seven apprentices nationally, working with experienced bee farmers. A full time bee farmer can manage up to 300 hives. There are opportunities to do this part-time and freelance as well. For more information about this you can look at the Rowse Honey website.
Mark Yates
Member of the Careers Writers Association
