Northland Labour Market Development Plan

The Northland Labour Market Development Plan is an action plan that allows for a better understanding of the wider labour market dynamics and the ability to undertake a range of targeted initiatives, thereby adding to the existing work already being undertaken by a range of agencies.

The plan was created by the Northland Labour Market Forum which comprises the following agencies: Career Services rapuara, Northland Chamber of Commerce, Department of Labour, Enterprise Northland, Ministry of Social Development, NorthTec, Tertiary Education Commission and Te Puni Kokiri.

The forum has a vision that all Northlanders should enjoy, and prosper within, a resilient, growing, diverse and vibrant economy. Its purpose is to take a planned and shared approach to addressing Northland's unique labour market needs, by focussing on the following key areas:

• better knowledge of the labour market
• increased workplace productivity
• greater working age participation rates
• increased job attraction and retention rates
• better levels of foundation skills

The Labour Market Forum and development plan build on the work first started by the Northland Skills Forum and the “Meeting The Skills Challenge in Northland” plan.

This new approach acknowledges that there are a number of elements that drive labour market development and that Northland must seek to address all of them rather than just focussing on skills issues alone.