PECM Issue 35 2018 | Page 68

CONTROL & AUTOMATION PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT AUTOMATE AUTOMATE TO ACCELERATE – WHY FOOD FIRMS MUST SEIZE THE BREXIT OPPORTUNITY Automate to accelerate; robots produce more items at a faster rate and at a higher level of quality By Tony McDonald, Sales and Marketing Director of Ilapak UK While the use of robotics and automation in the UK food and drink industry has been steadily growing over the past decade, Britain is still lagging behind many of its international counterparts. As the lowest G7 nation, UK sits 22nd in the world robot league table with just 71 robots per 10,000 workers, behind nations such as Slovenia (137), Sweden (223), and South Korea (631). This could be about to change, however, as an unlikely source is set to herald a long-awaited robot revolution in food production… A BREXIT EXODUS One of the main barriers to greater uptake of automation, particularly amongst SMEs, is the cost of unskilled labour 68 PECM Issue 35 versus investment in robotics technology. Thanks to the EU’s free movement of workers, Britain’s food and drink industry has benefitted from cheap labour for a number of years – in fact, it employs the highest share of EU migrant workers (30 per cent) compared with any other UK sector, employing around one fifth of the two million EU nationals working in Britain. This figure is at its highest on fruit and vegetable farms, where 99 per cent of workers come from Eastern Europe. But Brexit is set to change the labour landscape in just a few short years. The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) reported that 47 per cent of companies in Britain’s food supply chain said their EU workers were considering their future as a direct result of the June 2016 Brexit vote. On farms the impact is starker still – according to the National Farmers’ Union, in the crucial harvest month of September 2017, 29 per cent of roles went unfilled, the first shortfall since records began back in 2014. Brexit, combined with a skills shortage brought about an ageing domestic workforce and a lack of British young people coming into the industry – not to mention the 2020 deadline for the new National Minimum Wage – is giving the UK’s food and drink businesses a staffing dilemma. Faced with an impending lack of cheap labour, many are turning to robots to fill the gap.