HR Articles

Atlanta Tech Jobs for Food Science Technicians

The number of Atlanta tech jobs for food science technicians should continue growing in the coming years.

Food science technicians work with other scientists to conduct research, development, and testing on food and other agricultural products. They may conduct tests on food additives and preservatives to ensure that they comply with U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulations.

Most employers require any science technician to have some form of post-secondary training, such as an associate degree or certificate in applied science or a science-related technology, according to the Georgia LaborMarket Explorer.

There were about 270,800 science technicians throughout America during 2008, with about 21,900 of those positions belonging to agricultural and food science technicians. Employment in the sector is expected to increase by 9 percent between 2008 and 2018.

The largest industries that employed agricultural and food science technicians throughout Georgia in 2006 were:

• Grain and oilseed milling
• Colleges, universities and professional schools
• Employment services
• Animal slaughtering and processing
• Junior colleges
• Bakeries and tortilla manufacturing
• Dairy product manufacturing
• Animal food manufacturing
• Management, scientific, and technical consultants
• Management of companies and enterprises

During 2008, the median wage for agricultural and food science technicians throughout the nation was $16.34 per hour.

Some related occupations include: soil and plant scientists; biochemists and biophysicists; microbiologists; environmental scientists and specialists; chemical technicians; and environmental science and protection technicians.

Jobs in Atlanta Georgia Not Recovering On Par with Nation

Those looking for jobs in Atlanta Georgia may be facing a tough task, as the city is taking longer than most others to recover from the economic recession.

The Brookings Institution's third-quarter MetroMonitor found that while the nation has begun recovering from the recession, the metro Atlanta area is lagging behind. Of the 100 metro areas included in the report, Atlanta was ranked 94th.

The report found that Atlanta's unemployment rate increased by 1.3 percent from Q2 to Q3 2009. In addition, the city was ranked 84th for overall employment, which has decreased by 7.3 percent since jobs peaked during Q3 2007.

In comparison, the nation as a whole saw its unemployment rate increase by .5 percent from Q2 to Q3 of this year, while overall employment declined by 4.6 percent. The national average unemployment rate for that period was 9.5 percent, compared with the metro average of 9.6 percent and Atlanta's rate of 10.4 percent.

Although Atlanta's gross metropolitan product has decreased by 4.7 percent from its peak during Q3 2007, the city's current gross metropolitan product increased by .3 percent from Q2 to Q3 2009. At the same time, housing prices in Atlanta declined by 2.4 percent during Q3, compared to a 3 percent decline for metro areas and a 1.3 percent drop across the country.

"While the national recession appeared to end in the third quarter of 2009, it continued in a number of metropolitan areas," Alan Berube, research director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings Institution and co-author of the report, said. "In most metro areas where the regional economy expanded, job growth remained elusive.

"The national-level employment report for November indicates that more metropolitan areas may be adding jobs in the current quarter," he continued. "But the highly uneven effects of the downturn across metropolitan areas practically guarantee that, absent deliberate policies to help the hardest-hit communities, the nascent recovery will fail to be truly national in scope."