With the largest workforce in northern England, world-class universities and a commitment to long-term investment, Leeds City Region has the talent to help business succeed and grow.
With the largest workforce in northern England, world-class universities and a commitment to long-term investment, Leeds City Region has the talent to help business succeed and grow.
At 1.4 million people and with 7 million people within an hour’s drive, Leeds City Region’s workforce is the largest in northern England. It’s also one of the most highly skilled, with 35% being educated to degree level.
This is only likely to grow in the future, as the region produces over 39,000 graduates each year from our nine universities – almost half of whom graduate in STEAM subjects (science, technology, engineering, arts and maths).
This pipeline of skilled graduates is further bolstered by 14 higher education colleges, University Training Colleges and the Leeds City Region Apprenticeship Programme, which are working to ensure future generations have the skills required to drive businesses growth.
With access to hard economic facts, case studies from leading companies and business support packages available, find out how we can help you make the case for investing in Leeds City Region. Contact our experts for more information.
We are committed to long-term investment in our talent. The Leeds City Region's Strategic Economic Plan outlines our ambition to increase the high level skills by 2036.
The key actions of this strategy are providing more and better apprenticeships, delivering great education that is connected to business, improving people's employability and access to jobs, building workforce skills and attracting talent, and addressing skills gaps and shortages.
To help meet these goals, we’re working with the education sector to deliver new capital projects, such as new campuses and labs to ensure we have the best environments for learning.
We’re also bringing businesses and educators together so that courses prepare students to be able to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow.
Leeds City Region’s global outlook continues to grow, with 210,000 students from 150 countries who study here at our higher education institutions, and stay connected with university alumni networks.
That's a huge pool of native multi-linguists for businesses that rely on fluent communication for international competitive edge, alongside 9,000 students studying professional modern languages here.