BUSINESS NEWS: Construction managers and civil engineers among top 10 jobs in demand
Anthony Albanese’s National Skills Week has wrapped up, revealing the top 10 jobs in highest demand over the next five years include construction managers and civil engineers.
The jobs are:
- construction managers
- civil engineering professionals
- early childhood teachers
- registered nurses
- ICT (information and communications technology) business and systems analysts
- software and applications programmers
- electricians
- chefs
- child carers
- age and disability carers
Will Twomey, director of solutions consultancy Procore, says it’s no surprise that construction managers and civil engineers are top of the list.
“The construction industry is currently under immense pressure, facing a number of challenges, including rising commodity prices, supply chain disruptions, and a protracted labour shortage.”
More than 30 per cent of construction businesses reported job vacancies in May, and according to Procore a third of Australian construction leaders believe the industry is suffering from “brain drain” – the mass exodus of highly trained or qualified workers, because they sense instability or a lack of opportunity.
“Traditionally male-dominated and manual labour-oriented, the construction industry is quickly transforming due to the influence of climate change and the impact of accelerated technological development,” Twomey said.
“New roles and career opportunities are being created in the industry all the time – due to an increased focus on sustainability and with robotics and automation replacing a lot of physical and administrative tasks.
“We must continue to educate the market about what it’s really like to work in construction, and in particular, ensuring young women are aware of the exciting opportunities in sectors they may have previously discounted.”
The Currency Exchange Fund partners with Climate Bonds Initiative
The Currency Exchange Fund (TCX) has joined the Climate Bonds Partners Programme to support the global development of a capital market which offers the most transparent and effective route to supporting the transition to a low-carbon economy.
TCX is a development finance initiative offering a solution to the risk that comes with cross-border lending to emerging markets.
This partnership will promote green bonds and encourage the adoption of responsible financing practices by international investors.
Sean Kidney, Climate Bonds Initiative chief executive said TCX “possesses an enormous level of market knowledge that will be invaluable in our cooperative efforts to strengthen green and climate-based investment”.
Ruurd Brouwer, chief executive of TCX said: “Helping issuers manage currency risk related to green bond issuances in hard currencies will increase the risk-resilience of green financing and associated development impact.
“Financial and environmental sustainability go hand in hand. The ability of TCX to offer long-term foreign exchange hedging at scale in almost any currency opens up the green bond market without adding currency risk to issuers.”
Home buyers concerned about flood damage – not rising sea levels
Almost half of Australians are not concerned about rising waters impacting their homes, a study from Compare the Market has found. Another 11.2 per cent have never even considered if their current home may be under threat of rising waters in the future.
This combined number is still smaller than America and Canada, where a higher percentage of people report not being worried (64.6 per cent and 60.7 per cent, respectively).
Risa Palm together with Toby Bolsen from Georgia State University in the US penned in a piece for The Conversation in March, quoting their research that: “buyers of coastal properties are financially able to be more risk-oblivious and can afford the higher rate for insurance or be self-insured.”
One reason could be that rising sea levels seem a bit too far off for buyers to consider it a short-term problem.
However, while rising sea levels might be a non-issue for home-buyers, one short-term problem buyers have been seeing as a real threat is flood damage from severe weather patterns.
A massive 85.7 per cent of Australians (the most out of the three countries) said they would avoid purchasing property in an area under the threat of flooding in the next 10 years.
Grattan Institute says old trucks should be banned
Grattan Institute research has found that exhaust pollutants from trucks kill more than 400 Australians a year, and contribute to lung cancer, strokes, heart disease, asthma, pneumonia and type two diabetes.
There are almost 15,000 highly polluting trucks and buses manufactured before 2003 in Sydney and nearly 17,000 highly polluting heavy vehicles in Melbourne – making up around 20 per cent of the heavy vehicle fleet. The Grattan truck plan: practical policies for cleaner freight, suggests that pre-2003 diesel trucks should be banned in Sydney and Melbourne from 2025.