Supply chain funding plays a vital role in ensuring the UK sits alongside other countries on the global engineering stage, it has been claimed.
Several major companies, including Airbus, Rolls-Royce, Vestas and GKN, have called on the government to reinstate investment due to weaknesses identified in British suppliers with regards to new technology, the Daily Telegraph reported.
The previous adminstration had agreed to solve this issue by providing supply-chain capability funding as part of the creation of the new National Composites Centre, but this was dropped by the new coalition government.
Colin Sirett, head of research and technology business development at Airbus, told the newspaper: "We need a strong industrial supply chain. So part of this [centre] has to be support for projects that not only benefit the primes [like Airbus] but can be exploited by the small business supply chain."
Recently, a study commissioned by the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs and carried out by English Farming and Food Partnerships indicated that there are "serious failings" in the UK produce supply chain.
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