Sweet news for region’s young jobseekers

More than 600 opportunities will be available over each of the next three years across the UK and Ireland, including 300 paid work experience placements, the company announced today.

They will be across all areas of the business and at all levels, from factory floor operators and field sales assistants to management.

The programme is part of Nestlé’s European Youth Employment Initiative to help 20,000 people across Europe under the age of 30 find employment by 2016.

Nearly 1m people aged 16 to 24 are unemployed in the UK and Ireland’s youth unemployment rate stands at nearly 30 per cent.

Nestlé UK and Ireland CEO Fiona Kendrick said: “With youth unemployment steadily rising we all need to play our part in creating opportunities for the next generation. Attracting new talent and investing in future skills is key to our continued success.”

The company is also teaming up with social enterprise group MyKindaCrowd to offer skills and employability training to more than 12,000 school and college students.

The announcement has been welcomed by Julian Sturdy, Conservative MP for York Outer.

“I’m absolutely delighted by this news,” he said.

“It shows that Nestlé are investing not only in the city but in its skills base as well, which is so important, and that sends a really strong and encouraging message out there that the economy not only locally in York and across Yorkshire is improving but also across the country.

“I think it’s so important that companies like Nestle work closely with local colleges and schools to really improve the local skills base and this demonstrates quite clearly that they are doing exactly that.”