Engineering trade enrolments have dropped a third

A 15-year low arriving at the worst possible time

The number of people in apprenticeships and workplace-based training fell to 108,315 in 2025, the lowest count since 2011 and down 32% from the record 158,570 reached in 2022. This is not a plateau. A July 2026 briefing to Tertiary Education Minister Penny Simmonds showed Q1 2026 enrolments running 11% below Q1 2025. The slide is accelerating.

The damage clusters in exactly the trades New Zealand needs to build. Engineering-related training is down a third to 29,870, architecture and building down 29% to 28,650, and agriculture and environmental studies has halved since 2022 to 9,390. These are the people who would be building water pipes, substations and roads in three years’ time.

The infrastructure collision

The water sector shows the scale of the mismatch. Philip Aldridge, chief executive of the Energy and Infrastructure Industry Skills Board, points to a $48 billion investment plan over 10 years under the new water entities that needs 6000 new people, while “the training pipeline is nowhere near 6000 people.” His warning is blunt: “we’re going to struggle for labour … and we’ll be over-reliant on immigration to fill those gaps”.

Electricians tell the same story. In July 2026, Master Electricians chief executive Alexandra Vranyac-Wheeler said 3,000 to 4,000 apprentices need to start each year to meet demand, but only about 1,200 entered in 2025. New Zealand is already short 6,000 electricians, a gap masked only because the economy is too weak to generate the demand that would expose it. Turn the growth back on and the shortage becomes a hard ceiling.

Plumbing is worse. New apprentice numbers dropped 27% in 2026 on top of a 2025 figure that had already halved, even as Infometrics forecasts about 1,450 plumbing, gasfitting and drainlaying jobs to fill in the next year. Master Plumbers chief executive Greg Wallace notes only 17% of the industry is taking on apprentices and admits the sector is “not good at workforce planning to meet those peaks and demands.”

The employer trap

Here is the sharpest image in the whole story. BCITO chief executive Jason Hungerford says around 600 people are ready and willing to start an apprenticeship right now. The willing trainees exist. What is missing is employer confidence to sign them on.

The maths explains why. An apprentice costs an employer roughly $58,000 in first-year salary, against a government incentive of just $6,000 that Master Electricians says is not enough to persuade employers in this economy. With unemployment at 5.6% in June 2026, the EMA’s Alan McDonald says “many businesses have been focused on retaining the staff they already have rather than taking on new employees”, delaying investment amid higher costs and weak demand. Training an apprentice is precisely the discretionary spend a cautious firm cuts first.

Retention compounds it. Hungerford argues “a bigger issue than growing our apprentices is how do we retain them”, noting 75,000 people left building and construction in the past year or two. Qualified tradespeople are also leaving for Australia straight after certification, so even the trainees who finish do not all stay.

Policy churn made it structural

The cyclical dip sits on top of years of instability. Primary Industry Training Organisation chief executive Ginny Vincent points to “six years-plus of structural change” and uncertainty over how training is funded and delivered. In June 2025, the EMA warned Parliament that after “a long period of reform, instability, financial challenges and a growing gap between industry and the vocational education and training system”, employers had already shifted to private training options seen as better value. A fragmenting ecosystem makes national workforce planning harder still.

The 2022 peak was itself artificial, propped up by the government’s Apprenticeship Boost subsidy. When it wound down and construction contracted, numbers fell fast. This trough, though, is unusually deep, and the policy churn means the rebound will be slower.

What happens next

There is one green shoot. The Manufacturing and Engineering Industry Skills Board reports companies now facing skills shortages and “looking to take on more apprentices” as the sector recovers. But training numbers lag economic recovery by 12 to 18 months at minimum, so even a rebound now leaves a hole through 2027 and beyond.

Apprenticeships are already an election-year flashpoint. Labour’s Shanan Halbert warned in August 2026 that the skills crisis is driving Kiwis offshore, and the party pledged $21 million for Maori-led trades training on 29 August. The government has the briefing showing the deterioration but no announced response. Until someone closes the gap between a $58,000 cost and a $6,000 incentive, the 600 willing trainees stay on the sidelines, and the bill for that will land on every business that needs to build something this decade.

Sources

• Apprenticeship numbers hit 15-year low (2026-09-03)
• Major shortfall of electrical apprentices entering the system (2026-07-14)
• Plumber shortage: Not enough people in the pipeline to fill the gaps (2026-08-24)
• Businesses holding back on hiring as labour market weakens (2026-06)
• Train Them or Lose Them: Halbert Warns Skills Crisis Is Driving Kiwis Offshore (2026-08-18)
• EMA Submission to the Education and Workforce Committee on the Education and Training Amendment Bill (2025-06)