Food and drink jobs: A national opportunity

With labour shortages intensifying and nearly 1m young adults currently outside work or training, the UK food and drink system is one of the country’s most immediate and scalable employment opportunities.

Food system jobs

The UK food and drink supply chain employs around 4.1 million people in 2025 - around 1-in-8 UK jobs. Most jobs are in retail and away-from-home (AFH).

To compare, the NHS employs around 2.0 million people across the whole UK, meaning the food system is roughly twice the size.

One thing that the two bodies have in common is that they are present across the whole UK unlike  the financial industry which is concentrated in London and the South East.

This national footprint means food and drink offers job opportunities in a wide range of roles, in locations that are, generally, accessible to people where they live.

The major exception to this may be in agricultural roles or roles involving processing of raw agricultural materials.

In these cases, a lack of transport and limited local accommodation can be a barrier to accessing work, as highlighted in a 2024 report Independent Review Into Labour Shortages In The Food Supply Chain.

Where are the vacancies?

The sheer size of the food system workforce means that HR professionals must recruit constantly to replace those that retire or leave.

This ongoing recruitment is essential to maintaining current system capacity and ensuring food security for shoppers.

At any one time, there are at least 20,000 online ads for roles in the food supply chain, for roles across the UK.

Many of the roles are entry-level, not requiring specific skills or experience which, again, offers accessibility.

Evolving the food workforce

Maintaining the current workforce - and current capacity - is a formidable task, but this is just the challenge for today and this alone is not enough. The workforce challenge is still evolving.

Firstly, the UK population continues to grow rapidly and therefore the ability to supply food, either from within the UK or from overseas, cannot remain static, it has to grow year-by-year.

Capacity must be greater but, given the rising cost of labour, this will ideally be achieved by growing labour productivity, rather than simply adding more workers.

Secondly, the mission of the UK food and drink system is evolving. Just supplying food and developing capacity is not sufficient.

To be 'future-fit', the food system must also deliver better health outcomes, better environmental performance and better economic resilience than it does now.

This is the challenge for tomorrow and it will require new skills and new ways of working. So, food and drink businesses need to focus on evolving the workforce as well as maintaining numbers.

Meeting the workforce challenge

Future workforce challenges are tough – a quick fix will not be easy. Rather than a sudden shock, this may be seen as a quiet crisis that is building over time, However, there is another dimension to consider.

Many people across the UK struggle to access the labour market, including young adults and those with long-standing illnesses or disabilities.

Almost one million young adults are currently “NEET” (i.e. not in education, employment or training) and the number is rising.

This creates a clear opportunity to address business and social challenges by bringing together food and drink employers with people currently struggling to find their first job – and this opportunity exists nationally.

Read IGD’s latest free report Food & Drink Workforce, A Quiet Crisis Building.