Seminar on apparel industry

Press, 17 October 1986, Page 5

Seminar on apparel industry

Thirty-eight vocational guidance counsellors, careers advisers, home economics and sewing teachers and Labour Department staff attended a seminar in Christchurch yesterday run by the Apparel Industry Training Board. Mrs Leslie Madigan, the board’s training adviser, said the seminar was to make people aware of the , wide range of jobs, within industry.

seminars are being held throughout New Zealand. Many young people did not consider the apparel industry when looking for jobs because they thought the only opportunity it offered was to become a machinist, he said. “The industry is not involved solely with clothing — it covers most sewn products,” Mrs Madigan said. “All those products need to be researched and designed, planted for

production, cut, sewn and marketed. "The job opportunities are for research and development people, designers, fabric handlers, buyers, pattern makers, cutters, machine mechanics, machinists with a variety of skills, finishers and dispatchers.” There were also managerial and marketing jobs available. Mrs Madigan said the board had decided to run

the seminars when it found that most employees entered the industry “by accident.” “They did not actually consider it as a career when they were at school. It seems that we were not tapping the resources that were there.” Mrs Madigan said the seminar was well received. Many careers advisers had not been of the opportuni-