Welcome from Mark Ryder, Strategic Director for Communities (Acting)

Hello and welcome to the March edition of Warwickshire Means Business.

This month we reflect upon some key events which have taken place recently that will benefit the county's business community in a number of sectors in the short, medium and long-term.

I was delighted to attend our annual Skills Conference. This event has become an important spring date in the region's business calendar and, as always, it brought together businesses and education-providers in a positive and constructive way. It generated a number of ideas to be taken forward to help address the skills gap.

At the event we officially unveiled a new initiative, our Small Business Apprenticeship Support Programme which will support a range of small businesses to cover the costs of new apprenticeships through an innovative use of the county council's Apprentice Levy,

The “My Hospitality Warwickshire” campaign, co-organised by the county council, was also a great success. Local hotels joined forces to deliver some fascinating and informative events and workshops which gave young people a taste of the career opportunities offered by the hospitality sector

Many useful contacts were made at during those events, as they were at the Warwickshire Food & Drink Expo where Warwickshire’s astonishingly diverse range of produce was enjoyed by a steady stream of visitors from near and far. Our guests from Jordan clearly enjoyed their visit and it is good to know that they returned to the middle-east fully-informed about the glory of fresh-baked bread from Rugby, real ales from Nuneaton, Stratford coffee and lollipops from Leamington!

At the county council we work with our partners to support businesses throughout the county and in this edition of WMB you can read about a great example of that co-ordinated approach. Stratford-based ICM is growing and creating jobs with support that came from partnership working between Coventry and Warwickshire LEP Growth Hub, Warwickshire County Council and Coventry and Warwickshire Business Support and Green Business Programmes that are part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund.

I hope you enjoy this edition of Warwickshire Means Business. If you have any comments or there is an issue or a story that you think we should cover in a future edition please email brianhalford@warwickshire.gov.uk