LAST month saw the launch of the South Tees Development Corporation (STDC) master plan.

This is an ambitious plan that aims to create 20,000 jobs over the next 25 years through the transformation of the former SSI UK steel works site in Redcar.

It’s important to never lose sight of why the Development Corporation is needed.

The demise of SSI UK was an act of economic vandalism that could have been avoided.

Jobs were lost, communities left bereft and suppliers unpaid.

There were also great concerns about the future as we faced the prospect of skills and capabilities in important manufacturing areas potentially being gone from the area forever.

However, from such devastation, something truly transformational can emerge.

I have no part in the Development Corporation and can therefore look as objectively as possible.

I see the regeneration of this site as nothing less than the biggest industrial opportunity this country has seen since the Second World War.

The only development that seems comparable is the London dockyards of the 1980s, where the decaying cranes and docks were transformed into the likes of Canary Wharf.

Lessons need to be learned from the Dockyards scheme, of which I think STDC are fully aware.

First, is that the regeneration was based upon financial services, which had little connection with the industries which went before, as well as high value residential development.

Secondly, very much linked with the first, the community of Tower Hamlets felt excluded from any regeneration and wealth creation.

Although the luxury flats and skyscrapers of Canary Wharf were next door, for those residents it may have been on the moon.

The South Tees project offers fantastic opportunity to build on the strengths of the area’s past, but it must use that history and manufacturing excellence to attract, develop and build the factories of the future, ready for the fourth industrial revolution.

The site should be the cluster for modern manufacturing based upon the area’s traditional strengths of energy, materials and chemicals.

These firms will create well-paid, highly-skilled jobs that will go to local people.

The site will not be the only successful economic, but should act as a catalyst that can benefit the whole of the Tees Valley and North-East.

Nepic is holding an industry-led STDC consultation event on Thursday, November 23, to help shape the strategy for the next 25 years.

For more details visit www.nepic.uk 

Iain Wright is chief executive at the North-East Process Industry Cluster (Nepic)