February 4, 2008

Labour Crunch

Koreans learning to operate heavy equipment

Brian Martin

correspondent

Do you know anybody who can slice sushi with a construction excavator? Kent Orrock does.

Orrock is the human resources program manager with the B.C. Road Builders and Heavy Construction Association.

He has recently returned from Seoul, Korea where he visited with a class of 19 heavy equipment operators who are taking a four-month course in the hope of landing jobs in Canada – specifically in British Columbia.

The course offers a heavy emphasis on English language training, both oral and written.

“Some of them are just fantastic operators,” he said.

“They had a little thing they put on the teeth of an excavator and they cut sushi with it.”

They wrapped up their training in December and spent January studying Canadian culture.

The aim is to have them eligible to be hired by B.C. employers under the provincial nominee program which fast-tracks the normal federal immigration system.

One trainee has already received a job and three more are expected to be hired within days.

These are not kids.

The majority of the candidates are in their thirties with two or three in their forties.

Orrock said they see great opportunities for employment in Canada and they also are very interested in the educational opportunities their children will have.

A group in India has recently expressed interest in duplicating the Korean experience.

There is no doubt the heavy equipment field in B.C. needs all the help it can get.

A study two years ago showed there were about 6,000 pieces of heavy equipment standing idle in the province because no operators could be found.

The industry, like much of the construction business, is facing a retirement rate of 40 per cent over the next five to seven years, Orrock said.

The Korean program, which was co-ordinated by Hunt International, a world wide recruitment and human resources firm, is the result of an ambitious training and apprenticeship program recently undertaken by the Road Builders and Heavy Construction Association under Orrock’s direction.

A few months ago the association, working with the Industry Training Authority (ITA), the provincial government organization that oversees apprenticeship training, launched the first heavy equipment apprenticeship program in British Columbia.

It is among the first in Canada with the only other one located in the Atlantic provinces.

The program starts with a 20-day foundation course which introduces students to the basics of the industry and covers safety, civil engineering and equipment.

This is followed by training on actual equipment – bulldozers, heavy articulated rock trucks, backhoes, excavators, loaders and graders.

Although the equipment course was designed to be four weeks long, the actual length depends on who is offering it.

In the Lower Mainland, the Operating Engineers offer the course over two weeks, but expect much of the work to be done on the students’ own time.

On Vancouver Island, Malaspina College provides the same course over five weeks.

Orrock said that he expects in 2008 that more institutions will be offering the course and they will provide four weeks of training.

At the end of the program, successful students get an ITA approved certificate of qualification.

In addition, they earn competency certificates on each separate piece of equipment.

In a recent move, the ITA has given qualified employers authority to offer the course to their own employees.

A pilot project that started Jan. 10 and runs until March 31 involves four companies.

They are Pieter Kiewit Sons Co. Ltd., Tyam Construction Ltd., Nechako Northcoast Construction of Terrace and JJM Construction Inc.

The association is planning to launch a new program that focuses on underground utilities – gas lines, water and sewer lines and so forth.

It plans to have that up and running in 2008.

In addition, an existing asphalt paving training program may also be extended to employers who are qualified and who wish to offer it.

These moves along with plans to introduce heavy equipment operating courses to the secondary school level through the provincial ACE IT program are all aimed at relieving a chronic shortage of skilled labour.

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