Charlotte Varcoe
THE diversity of career pathways within the timber industry has been highlighted with a brand new $250,000 campaign – with the City of Mount Gambier “decorated” in the branding.
Aiming to highlight the differing career choices available throughout the industry, the South Australian Forest Products Association (SAFPA) alongside the state government launched the ‘This is Wood Work’ campaign.
The campaign will showcase how people interested in careers within the industry could benefit from the growing diverse pathways.
SAFPA chief executive officer Nathan Paine said the campaign would “shine a spotlight” on all of the jobs and careers in the forest industries in South Australia.
“It is shining a light on the different and diverse jobs and careers in the forest industries whether that is out in the forest, those which harvest and haul timber, the jobs in the mills all the way through to the people who work in the offices behind the scenes,” Mr Paine said.
“We will be promoting the campaign into metropolitan Adeide and there is still a need to look at where the industry is going and growing as it is a growing industry.”
He said while the campaign was launched on Friday, it would be rolled out across the Limestone Coast on Monday and over the next six weeks it would start being active on social media.
“We currently and indirectly employ more than 21,000 people and that is going to grow in the future,” Mr Paine said.
“This campaign will really demonstrate to school leavers and people looking for a career that forest industries is a place they cannot just find a job today but find a career and a satisfying career to work through their entire lifetime.”
He said there would be a range of different areas, including those using artificial intelligence.
“There are also options and areas like biofuel, bio-fertalisers and we know there is a need to decarbonise our economy,” Mr Paine said.
“We also know that wood fiber is going to be one of the critical pathways to ensuring we decarbonise.”
Minister for Forestry Clare Scriven said the initiative was good, labelling the industry as “bilateral” for the area.
“We want to see people who are tech savvy, who are skilled and who are environmentally driven because this is one of the most renewable, sustainable industries in our region,” Ms Scriven said.
“We want people to know the breadth and depth of different careers which are available and that includes everything from perhaps what people are used to seeing being out in the forest or being in the mill but through to artificial intelligence and robotics because all of those technologies are a big part now of what this industry is.”
Ms Scriven said the careers in the industry had changed a lot with a lot of awareness around mill work and work in the forest./
“The industry is much more diverse than that and when you think about it, every part of our life is affected by supplementing this industry, whether it is the frames we have for our homes, the paper we are writing or the egg cartons our eggs come in,” she said.
“The masterplan has been developed by industry to identify what their key priorities are, out of those priorities come individual projects so the industry and others are invited to make proposals and bring them to me for potential funding through the masterplan.”
