The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Coimbatore News : Manpower shortage to ease soon

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Tuesday, Jun 28, 2011
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore

Manpower shortage to ease soon

M. Soundariya Preetha

Industries say many engineering graduates will turn to core sectors

BENEFITS:Small and medium-scale enterprises in Coimbatore are taking measures to meet the manpower needs.

COIMBATORE: Small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) here hit by severe manpower shortage and are taking several measures to find a solution. They expect the situation to ease at least for another three or four months.

A large of the SMEs here makes components for large-scale industries.

High interest rates and a slowdown in some of the key manufacturing sectors have brought down the production and delivery pressures for the units. As production pressures ease and job requirements see a slight dip in the units affected by the slowdown, the SMEs expect a temporary relief.

Several unskilled and graduate employees have come seeking job during the last few days, says a leading automobile component manufacturer here.

Though man power shortage continues, it does not have severe impact on production and many units are able to get workers. Industries here were working at lower capacities because of power and labour shortage. Earlier, the industries found it extremely difficult to get workers. Now, though the shortage continues, the units are able to get candidates, he says. Further, those who have completed college studies start looking out for jobs in June-July.

Since the number of engineering colleges has gone up in the State and not all students get into the Information Technology sector, there are many engineering graduates who are coming back to the core sectors now.

It is mostly the mechanical engineering students who are looking for jobs in the manufacturing industries.

They are recruited as trainee engineers, says K. Ilango, former president of Coimbatore District Small Industries' Association.

According to V. Krishna Kumar, general manager of Aquasub Engineering and of Aquapump Industries, the units continue to appeal to the Government to increase the number of Industrial Training Institutes in this region and improve them so that more candidates get into the institutes and the SMEs are able to recruit them when they complete their studies.

President of the association M. Kandhaswami says the small-scale industries continued to face 10 per cent to 15 per cent labour shortage.

The association was in talks with the Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS) to organise recruitment and training programme for workers from the Northern States. These workers will be placed at the small and medium-scale units here after the training.

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