"Despite the fascination with food and cookery, and the rise of the celebrity chef, it is difficult to find young people to fill the vacancies that are available," said the CEO of HTN, Michael Bennett.
"We currently have approximately 100 vacancies for apprentice chefs across all parts of Sydney.
"There are openings in restaurants, cafes, clubs, pubs and catering organisations that remain hard to fill," he said.
In an effort to address the shortage, HTN recently announced a new apprenticeship stream known as Total Chef Aspire.
Quality of culinary training
"The goal is to lift the overall quality of culinary training, while also raising apprentice completion rates, which are at a disappointingly low level," Michael Bennett said.
Currently, the completion rate for apprentice chefs across the industry is around 40 per cent, and a key goal of the new program is to improve those outcomes.
There are also challenges in attracting the right people to the industry.
"While there are many enthusiastic and hard working young people engaged in commercial cookery apprenticeships, there are often unrealistic expectations on the part of newcomers," Bennett said.
One of the chefs engaged in the program, Nino Zoccali from Sydney's Pendolino and La Rosa restaurants says that one of the biggest challenges for apprentice chefs is to gain a realistic understanding of what is required to succeed.
"They see the image of the celebrity chef, but some of them don't realise that all of those chefs have already done the hard yards.
Focus, passion and skill
"To really succeed you need to be focused and passionate, but you also need the skills and the capability to operate in a very disciplined way," he said.
The Aspire program is an intensive eight-week preparatory program of culinary training, combining face-to-face learning with on-the-job work placement.
It is designed to provide a stepping stone to a full apprenticeship with a guaranteed placement in a leading kitchen on successful completion.
Fully accredited training will be provided by TAFE NSW and William Angliss Institute of TAFE.
"It is aimed at attracting new and aspiring chefs and placing a priority on developing expertise across a broad range of skills, not just on narrow areas of competency," Bennett said.
"We are facing a serious shortage of capable and enthusiastic candidates and we need to do more to generate the pipeline of talent that will become the next generation of top chefs," he said.
