outside of the Northern Territory. This involves inconvenience to trainees and employers as well as high travel costs. Arguably, the distance from the training organisation is also less than optimal for the learning process.

Instrumentation is an area of skills shortage, and one predicted to increase with the growth of mining and resource companies in the Northern Territory. The LNG processing industry is also a significant user of these skills.

One of the main interstate training providers has indicated that the capacity to take Northern Territory trainees in the future is at risk given forecasts of a growing skills shortage in this area.

The Northern Territory Government Department of Education and Training (DET) has contracted the Major Industries Training Advisory Council (MITAC) to undertake a project to evaluate options for setting up a capability within the Northern Territory to fully train instrumentation trainees without the need to travel interstate.

The project addresses the risk of having insufficient skilled Instrumentation workers as well as the cost of training an increasing quantity of them.

MITAC's Electrotechnology Project Officer, Bob Potter will be responsible for project outcomes in collaboration with DET. Bob can be contacted on (08) 81 0077, 0407 720 569 or bob@mitac.org.au

For further information about the project click here.