Women urged to get into construction industry

CONSTRUCTION: Women make up only 2 per cent of all building trades workers, according to Statistics New Zealand. PHOTO/FILE

A Rotorua carpentry and electrical teacher says he thinks the construction industry could be presented more to young people as an option and would "absolutely" like to see more women involved.

Women make up only 2 per cent of all building trades workers, according to Statistics New Zealand, but the country is estimated to need 64,000 new building and construction jobs alone by 2020.

Auckland-based Destination Trades is a new company aiming to get more women trained and into apprenticeships or jobs in the industry.

It is launching a pilot programme, with 20 women of all ages, to take them through a 32-week carpentry training course before setting them up with apprenticeships.

Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology programme area lead for carpentry and electrical AJ Smith said both programmes had a number of female students and they regularly got females into the courses.

In the electrical programme there were three females in a class of about 23 and four females in the two Rotorua carpentry classes, he said.

Mr Smith said he would "absolutely" like to see more women take part in the programmes.

"I mean, it's an industry that caters for anyone really and if they are interested in the area it would be great to see them get involved."

He said he thought a reason for the lack of women in construction jobs was that it was a traditional and historical thing in New Zealand. While spending time in North America, he had noticed a lot more women in the industry.

However, he thought the mould was starting to be broken.

He said it was a case of exposing the industry to younger people in schools, and giving people the opportunity to get involved.

Mr Smith said he thought the focus in schools was on university and going down that career path, with trades often being left to students who were seen to be not as academically capable.

The building industry did require efficient work and intelligence, he said.

"I don't think it's presented to students as an option as much as it could be."

He said both carpentry and electrical offered good careers, and people could be successful in these areas.

Rotorua builder Roland Tissink said he did not know many women in the industry now, though he had in the past including a husband and wife team - "she was excellent, she did everything he could do".

"There's no reason why women can't do all of it but it is quite physically challenging."

Mr Tissink said it would be great if some women could make their mark on the construction industry.

Minister for Women and Associate Minister of Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Louise Upston has said the Government had a range of initiatives to attract more women into trades.

These included the Engineering to Employment campaign, targets for female participants in the Maori and Pacific Trades Training (MPTT) programmes, sponsoring the "Got a Trade, Got it Made" week in August, and the inaugural Women in Trades conference.

- Additional reporting NZME