The leather industry must keep its workforce in mind as a strength, notes Dr Mike Redwood in his latest column. Published by @ILMEditor.

Any reasonable world requires societies to provide decent jobs for its people. Whether it is explained by the Brundtland definition of Sustainability, the Sustainable Development Goals or straightforward common-sense, citizens require fulfilling work.

Since the 1990s, governments have increasingly made policy moves suggesting that all such work will need a university degree. This foolishly overlooks carpenters, bricklayers, plumbers, train drivers and ambulance drivers along with hundreds of other jobs that require a sound education and good training but not bachelor’s degrees.

For centuries, the leather trade has provided many of these jobs and continues to do so, but why do we do rarely discuss it?

It is heartening to see every part of the industry now promoting one of the great environmental strengths of leather: its durability, as well as the fact that most articles made with it can be repaired. This is an aspect of leather as a truly sustainable material that was widely ignored until the last few years. Tanners knew it, of course, but promoting and developing the point was considered of no value.

The value of leather industry jobs – to read the rest of this insightful article by Dr Michael Redwood, click on Leather Jobs.