Alongside his new role, Dr Read is external affairs director at Suez Recycling & Recovery UK, a position he has held for almost four years.
For the last two years Dr Read has led Suez’s work with the UK government on the development of the Resources & Waste Strategy and the associated consultations.
On his new role, he said in a statement: “It is with huge honour that I take on the role of 105th president of CIWM. As we approach a decade of significant change in the resource and waste sector, I look forward to working with colleagues and members alike, creating a newly skilled sector-based workforce that has the capacity to adapt to the wide range of forthcoming policy changes, whilst helping CIWM achieve its wider ambition to lead the transition to a world beyond waste.”
Founded in 1898 and representing more than 5,500 individuals in the UK and overseas, CIWM is a professional membership body for people working in or with the waste management sector.
Dr Read replaces the outgoing Trevor Nicoll, who was the membership body’s president for more than 18 months from November 2019. Mr Nicoll is currently assistant director of environment and operations at St Helens council, having previously spent nearly four years in a couple of positions with Cambridge city council and South Cambridgeshire district council.
Skills
In one of his first acts as president, Dr Read launched a Presidential Report for 2021, detailing the skills CIWM believes the waste sector must acquire during the next decade to deliver on government-led environmental policy measures.
The report calls on the government to provide strategic support so improved skills and increased employment, investment and cross-industry collaborations are facilitated in the coming decade. Otherwise, CIWM says, the skills gap could become “acute”.
The skills identified by the report’s stakeholders include systems thinking, communication and behaviour change, soft skills, data and IT, circular economy expertise and reuse and repair skills.
The report also outlines how businesses and organisations operating within the waste sector will need to forge “more collaborative, interconnected working relationships” with specialists in other industries to complement this expanded skills set.
Call to arms
Currently the UK’s waste sector turns over an estimated £9 billion per year, CIWM says, and provides 150,000 jobs through waste collection, treatment, recycling, reprocessing and disposal, alongside the generation of energy from waste.
“We need to up-skill our workforce and attract new talent whilst collaborating with other industries, academic institutions and leading professional bodies”
CIWM says the sector will have an “increasingly important role” to play in the next decade as the UK seeks to improve resource availability and security, while the need to supply quality secondary raw materials and feedstocks from a wide range of different waste streams also looks set to increase.
Dr Read said: “The resource and waste sector will sit at the heart of a future circular economy and a post-pandemic green recovery, but to ensure this can happen, we need to up-skill our workforce and attract new talent whilst collaborating with other industries, academic institutions and leading professional bodies.
“This year’s CIWM Presidential Report not only identifies the key skills that will support the resource and waste sector through forthcoming policy-based changes, but also acts as a call to arms, outlining how forward-planning, collaboration and government support are critical if this vitally important transition can take place.”
Related links
CIWM Skills for the Future report
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