Consultation with employers begins this month said Improve, an agency created by the UK government specifically to boost skills.

The UK's food and drink industry has one of the most poorly qualified workforces in the country, according to the agency.

About 19 per cent of the sector's employees has no qualifications, compared to the average of 11 per cent for the total workforce. One third of staff in the processing sector have no qualifications at all.

Improve said it plans to develop an entirely new framework for apprenticeship programmes with the employers.

Currently apprenticeships are available only in general food and drink manufacturing, meat and poultry processing, and bakery.

Improve plans to introduce one overall framework for apprenticeship programmes.

The framework can be adapted to meet the specific needs of any of the 10 sub-sectors within food and drink manufacturing, from dairy and fresh-produce processing, through to soft-drink manufacturing, brewing and distilling, the agency said.

Apprenticeship programmes will be made more attractive and accessible to a wider range of employees. They will also be made easier and cheaper for employers and training providers to operate, said Jack Matthews, the agency's chief executive.

"This will be a crucial reform," he said. "Recently the number of apprentices in training in our sector went into steep decline because of an earlier revamp which, although well-intentioned, didn't address employers' needs properly."

Improve took over responsibility for apprenticeships when it was formed in 2004. Matthews says the number is now rebounding but more reform is needed.

Completed apprenticeships in food and drink manufacturing subjects at level two have doubled in the last two years to 668 from 332, he said.

However the numbers remain small compared to other industries, where people complete apprenticeships in their thousands each year.

After consultation with employers, the same expansion has already been applied to the reform of National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) and Scottish Vocational Qualifications (SVQs) in food and drink manufacturing, he said.

The first of the new qualification standards will be available to training agencies and employers from September this year.

New learning units will be developed for sub-sectors other than meat and poultry and bakery, he said.

Improve will continue to develop the proposed new apprenticeship framework through to September and hopes to launch it in England, Wales, and Scotland from November.

In the meantime, Improve is preparing to run a second tranche of training under its "Young Apprenticeship" programme for 14 to 16-year-old starters.

Matthews hopes England will remove its upper age limit of 24 for apprentices, as Wales has already done.

In other related news Improve reported that two final consultation events took place on 30 January and 8 February for the proposed food and drink manufacturing diploma.

Those in attendance included employers, schools and training providers. The diploma qualification courses will be rolled out in schools from September 2009.

Meanwhile a new training programme for food and drink workers will launch in April, under what's being called the National Skills Academy for Food and Drink.

The academy is being funded with £4.4m from the government and will operate through five centres in England. Improve plans to expand the courses to the rest of the country later on.

Improve forecasts the Academy will deliver training and qualification to about 28,000 people during its first four years.