The Jobs Without Water project is an initiative of the Government of South Ausralia and is a South Australia Works in the Regions project delievered in partnership with the Murraylands Regional Development Board.

It has been developed to provide localised, strategic labour market advice and support to both employers and jobseekers of the Murraylands region in response to the changing dynamics of the regional labour market.

The Murraylands economy is diverse and extensive, but suffering critically from the drought with the most adversely affected industry being agribusiness, with the direct result being lost jobs on a significant scale.

The ‘Jobs Without Water’ project supports job seekers that fit into what we call the gap, where they do not qualify for Job Network Support (in particular the farming community) and to-date has successfully supported 86 job seekers into current employment.

Even though there are redundancies as agriculture businesses are in survival mode and reducing stock numbers, there are other sectors within the Murraylands region that are experiencing strong growth. The project has been able to successfully link numerous job seekers (in particular the farming community) to a broad range of various job vacancies and career opportunities.

Project objectives:

• Support employers to both understand and prepare themselves for the changing dynamics of the regional labour market
• Support job seekers (particularly the farming community) to increase their
  awareness of employment and career opportunities
• Collect, provide and maintain independent labour market advice for the Murraylands region
• Work with all Job Networks, local employers and decision makers to support the region through times of drought.

The Jobs Without Water project was built on the success of the LEO (Linking Employment Opportunities) Project which was developed in 2006 to support employers to prosper in a time of low unemployment and high job creation.

Whereas, the ‘Jobs Without Water’ project has been developed to sustain the Murraylands community through a period of conflicting stress created by business retraction (due to drought) and business growth (emergence of new industry types).

To-date, the ‘LEO’ (Linking Employment Opportunities) and ‘Jobs Without Water’ projects, have achieved outstanding results for the Murraylands. These projects have resulted in placing 80 job seekers into employment through employer education strategies with over 200 regional businesses.

Job prospects are identified in the ‘Time Tracker’ document which provides businesses with ongoing labour market advice and employment opportunities in spite of drought conditions.  We look forward to providing continued support of the region through this difficult transitional period.

Click on this link to take you to the Time Tracker report page.