A CIVIL engineering firm is calling on industry members to encourage young women to become the next generation of engineers.

Women make up around 11 per cent of all UK engineers and reports from not-for-profit organisation Engineering UK showing that the engineering industry currently has an annual shortfall of at least 20,000.

However Teesside-based Seymour Civil Engineering are backing a call to support women into helping to close the region's skills shortage within the sector.

Andrea Cartwright, head of training at Seymour Civil Engineering, said: "When it comes to the skills shortage within engineering, a lot of attention is focused on educating school leavers about the opportunities available within the sector.

"Yet we have a huge number of women in the region who are being overlooked as a potential answer to the skills crisis.

"The industries main concentration needs to be breaking down the stereotype of an engineer, changing the perception that a job in engineering means putting on PPE, heading out on a construction site and getting your hands dirty.

"There are so many opportunities within the sector that people just aren't aware of, largely because the multi-disciplines of engineering aren't well promoted."

Seymour is currently sponsoring 13 per cent of its workforce through further or higher education.

Melanie Kent, a quantity surveyor with the firm who is currently studying for a quantity surveying degree at Northumbria University, said: "I spend a lot of my time working on sites across the North-East and attitudes toward women onsite today have completely changed from ten years ago.

"As an industry, we've worked hard to change how engineering sees women, now it's time to change how women see engineering, by exposing them to the opportunities and informing them about the training available."