Agriculture traineeship graduates on the rise

Nindooinbah manager Nat McGhee said the agricultural industry was a good career path for young people, that offered diversity in jobs as a result of technological advancement in the industry.

Mr McGhee said they had three school based trainees working on the property in Beaudesert, two of whom were completing their cert III in agriculture.

"We have a good relationship with two schools in town, McAuley College and Emmaus College, as well as a trade college at the coast," he said.

"We have put on three people who are very much cattle focused, that do one day a week with us."

Mr McGhee said they work in collaboration with the high schools and UQ skills, and the students who had completed their traineeships with them, found employment easily.

"UQ skills come out once a term and spend one or two days out here doing assessments...it's very practical as well as theoretical," he said.

"The two students that completed two years with us got snapped up pretty quickly by stations in the Northern Territory."

He said the students generally study a certificate III in year 11 and 12, which is appealing to potential employers as they already have practical skills and experience.

"You see a lot of pastoral companies offering their staff cert III to upskill or for personal development," he said.

"The benefit (of the traineeship) is that the young kids get to work with older people, which increases their maturity because they have to interact with people of different ages and backgrounds, and learn to take responsibility for their actions."

The have a strong artificial reproduction focus at Nindooinbah and like to take on vet students but Mr McGhee said there were less vet students who could carry out the type of work that is needed in an operation like theirs.

"There is a limited supply of large animal vets coming through," he said.

"It's difficult because the vet industry keeps a hold on pregnancy testing and vet certified stuff, and not letting technicians do it.

"If they don't have the competence or people to do it, they are going to have to let technicians in to do it."

UQ Skills Program and Operations manager, Di Palmer said that education in the ag sector had evolved in line with significant growth in the industry, and that flexibility in learning was key for both students and employers.

"It's a global industry now, with produce that is sent all over the world," she said.

"People can come in and earn while they learn with the traineeship model.

"It can be school based or a full time traineeship, where they can work for a company and learn at the same time."

"It's a blended model with access to online content for learning that ensures understanding of the theoretical knowledge."

Ms Palmer said the students get hands-on experience with producers on-farm, as well as spending time with the UQ trainers at the Gatton campus, to learn best practice techniques.

She said the students can study remotely if, for example, they are employed on a property in North Queensland and can select units of competency that are specifically related to the industry they are in.

"They can learn on the job and provide evidence of their competency," she said.

"We can send trainers to them in some situations, if we get clusters of students from remote, regional locations.

"We want anyone in those remote and rural areas to have access to education and training if they choose."

Ms Palmer said access to Queensland state funding means that students can study with little or no cost to them, which is an incentive for students wanting to do further study or upskill, to take on different roles across the ag industry.

"We have had students that have started with us doing their certificate II in high school, progressed to a certificate III, into a diploma and used that to access an academic programs like a Bachelor of Agriculture," she said.

They currently have 12 schools in their Vocational Education training funded program, as well as additional schools that send students to join the mixed cohort group.

"That can again, be delivered at the Gatton campus, supported with the blended model where they can access learning content with our online management system," she said.

"There are also some students who complete a certificate II in rural operations with us, which is also a funded program through the state government.

"The certificate III is in a traineeship model where they can be school based, and be released from school one day per week to go and work for their employer, or they can be fully employed as a trainee and work full time at a farm."

Ms Palmer said overall, the number of students enrolled in traineeships had been increasing. She has seen the biggest growth in students interested in livestock, particularly students wanting to work in the beef industry.

"There are not a large number of Registered Training Organisations (RTO) that offer agriculture," she said.

"Our programs have become more blended to be able to access students further afield that can't come to campus all the time."

Ms Palmer said employers from the ag sector are looking for people that come with a combination of an understanding of theoretical knowledge as well as applied skills and that is what their traineeships offer.

"They want people that are work ready," she said.

She said technology has also become a focus, as a result of it's increasing use in many sectors of the ag industry and, there is education on offer to support this.

"We offer a course on understanding the use of drones, so they have the ability to use them on the farm to check things like water troughs," she said.

"The agricultural digital technology short course we offer focuses on Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and interpreting data and using that to implement into management of their properties."