Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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590. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the measures that are being taken to increase and encourage women to pursue a career in farming through education and agriculture courses; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51659/22]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The participation of under-represented groups, including women, in education, our workforce, and across industry, has been a core element of my policy objectives, and has featured prominently within this Government's programme of work. Specifically, to your question, the encouragement and support of women to pursue a career in farming has been reflected through my Department's policies across Higher Education, Further Education, and within the Apprenticeship system.

One of the five overarching objectives of the Action Plan for Apprenticeship 2021-2025is "Apprenticeship for All". In other words, ensuring that the profile of the apprenticeship population more closely reflects the profile of the general population. By December 2021, there were a total of 1,535 female apprentices, up from 60 in 2016 and only 665 at the end of 2019.

This increase is mainly due to the expansion of apprenticeship into new areas. Many of these new programmes are in occupations that have greater gender balance in the workplace such as financial services where 52% of participants are female across the four apprenticeships in the sector. Women also feature more strongly in the new apprenticeships in the hospitality, healthcare, property, sales, biopharma and ICT sectors. However, it is also important to note that female representation in craft apprenticeship has doubled in the last two and a half years.

The Action Plan contains a number of key deliverables designed to secure significantly greater diversity by:

- including the voice of under-represented cohorts in apprenticeship:

- putting in place an inclusive apprenticeship access and delivery structure; and

- monitoring and assessing targets and developing appropriate interventions.

Significant financial supports have been introduced this year under the Action Plan for Apprenticeshipto incentivise the uptake:

- A new Employer Grant of €2,000 per apprentice per annum was made available from January 2022. Its introduction meant that, for the first time, employers of all apprentices have access to financial support, either through direct payment of allowances to apprentices or through this employer grant.

- A new gender-based bursary for apprenticeship employers has also been launched. The bursary, which is worth €2,666, is an expansion of the ‘female bursary’ available to craft apprenticeship employers prior to 2022.

Information on apprenticeship was included on the CAO website for the first time for CAO 2022. This is expected to make a significant contribution to showing the range of learning and qualification options for school leavers. As part of this landmark change, a freephone helpline has been introduced for learners, parents and guidance counsellors to provide information on apprenticeship, including how to find an employer. The helpline supplements the existing guidance counsellor service at post-primary and further education and training levels.

Eleven new apprenticeship programmes were launched between 2020 and 2022, despite the pandemic, with further programme development approved for progression in areas including farming and horticulture, and a number of others at the initial proposal stage.

Teagasc received approval from the Apprenticeship Council (now the National Apprenticeship Alliance) to develop 5 apprenticeships: Farm Technician (Level 6), Farm Manager (Level 7), Sportsturf Management (Level 6), Horticulture (Level 6) and Stud Farm Assistant Management (Level 7).

There has also been a specific focus on female participation as part of the Generation Apprenticeship national promotional campaign. SOLAS ran a media campaign over three weeks in January 2021 promoting the apprenticeship route and celebrating diversity and the 1,000th female apprentice.

Under the Action Plan for Apprenticeship 2021-2025, targets and interventions for specific groups will be detailed through an Equity of Access subcommittee of the National Apprenticeship Alliance. This will ensure that the voice of under-represented groups is integral to the development of the apprenticeship system.

Within the Higher Education sector existing programmes to increase and encourage women to pursue a career in farming through education and agriculture courses include Springboard+ and Human Capital Initiative (HCI) Pillar 1.

Springboard+ complements the core State-funded education and training system and provides free and subsidised upskilling and reskilling higher education opportunities to the employed, unemployed and returners at NFQ level 6 to level 9 in areas of identified skills need, all of these areas demonstrate the responsiveness of the higher education sector to advances in technology and changes in our environment. Springboard+ 2022 is providing 75 places on 3 courses for the 2022/23 academic year. These include Diploma in Food and Agri-business, Postgraduate Diploma in Innovative and Sustainable Agriculture and MSc Ag Innovation.

Human Capital Initiative (HCI) Pillar 1 provides for Graduate Conversion Courses in a range of courses, building on the experience from ICT Conversion Courses under Springboard. There is one course on offer under HCI P1, the Postgraduate Diploma in Science in Data Analytics for Sustainable Agri-Food Production providing 20 places.

Human Capital Initiative Pillar 3, Innovation and Agility aims to ensure that courses in areas of skills needs demonstrate innovative methods of teaching and delivery, which will include flexibility in course provision. HCI Pillar 3 will deliver 24 projects in higher education institutions, 19 of which involve collaborations between institutions. One of these projects is related to Agri-tech.

The South East Technological University led AMASE: Additive Manufacturing Advancing the South East project will develop and deliver a new innovative, agile, and learner-centric Additive Manufacturing NFQ Level 7 Degree programme incorporating 5 no. Embedded Awards for upskilling employees in Industry. It proposes to co-design and co-deliver an innovative education and agile training platform to address these well identified and unmet education and training needs. Designed to specifically prepare individuals to be proficient in the design and implementation of advanced additive manufacturing systems for application across a multiplicity of key industrial sectors including the Agri-Tech sector.