THE agricultural industry in WA is struggling to find suitable employees with agricultural qualifications.
Many agricultural businesses are employing people from the Eastern States or other industries and believe rural education in WA needs immediate attention.
Australia Independent Rural Retailers (AIRR) state manager Floyd Sullivan said a concern was where future employees were going to come from.
Mr Sullivan, who is involved with the wholesaling of rural merchandising products to retailers, said in recent years he had been looking outside the agricultural industry for employees.
He said, as well as targeting people from the east, he focused on the mining sector because there were often people looking for a change in lifestyle.
"There is just nobody coming through the agricultural system, the pipeline has been broken somewhere," Mr Sullivan said.
"When people are disillusioned with the mining industry and don't want to travel any more and want to have some sort of stability in their home life, agriculture is the best alternative for that."
But Mr Sullivan said for agriculture to survive, there needed to be people to employ from within the industry itself.
The Muresk Old Collegians Association (MOCA) recently proposed that Muresk Agricultural College be turned into an industry-governed Australian Agribusiness University College.
Mr Sullivan said that proposal would benefit the agricultural industry and highlight the diverse career pathways that were available.
He said the proposed Agribusiness University College would help provide a wider scope of employment opportunities.
"It's coming from a foundation of agribusiness and is getting away from that farmer type career," he said.
"This proposal is very important and needs to go ahead for agriculture to survive and in order for us to get new graduates along that are keen.
"Agriculture needs that at the moment.
"Agriculture needs a whole face lift."
Mr Sullivan said there was a lack of promotion and advertising for agriculture from the government as well as universities.
He said agriculture didn't appear to be a glamorous industry and there was a lot of negativity associated with it.
"Agriculture is not promoted in a positive light," Mr Sullivan said.
"I guess when people are making up their minds in year 11 or 12, it's not a very fashionable or trendy industry to be involved in.
"But there are a range of employment opportunities and people need to be more aware of all the available pathways, not only in agriculture, but in agribusiness also."
CBH grower value manager David Feinberg also said agricultural companies were employing less and less people that had agricultural qualifications and the industry was struggling because of it.
He said the two main concerns were the competition with the mining sector and the negative perception of the agricultural industry.
"We need bright people coming through that have a passion for agriculture and at the moment, the fierce competition from the mining industry is just decimating many opportunities," Mr Feinberg said.
"Also, the perception of the agricultural industry is that we are an industry that is not in the best of health and therefore the possibility of a successful career is limited.
"That perception is incorrect and I think there is a wealth of opportunity in agriculture.
"I think the future is very rosy, even though we are having a drought at the moment, there is plenty of opportunity for the future.
"We would love to employ people that have an agricultural qualification, no matter what institution they come from, because they understand the fundamentals."
Mr Feinberg said the problem was a lack of communication within the industry and the education institutions had to understand what it was that agricultural businesses needed.
"My feeling is that in some cases the agricultural offering is not always going to be in-step with what the industry needs," he said.
"At the moment I feel there is segregation, we are not talking the same language, so the academic is confused about what the offering should be and hence the students are of the same mind.
"The challenge is how to get the whole industry sitting around the table talking the same language so that we are all supporting exactly the same thing."
