MANUFACTURERS throughout North Yorkshire will soon be able to call on a troubleshooting "A team" set up by Yorkshire Forward.

They will be among 20,000 manufacturing companies in Yorkshire set to benefit from the regional development agency's new "centre for manufacturing excellence."

It will deliver a new Manufacturing Advisory Service (MAS) offering "hands on" advice and support to the region's factories.

The centre, planned to open early next year, will offer an internet-based inquiry and response service, backed by a core team of experts paying trouble-shooting visits to companies around Yorkshire and Humber and will form part of a wider national network

The contract for developing and running the centre has been awarded to Yorkshire Enterprise Limited. Yorkshire Forward and the Department of Trade and Industry will share the costs of the £2.7m project to deliver the service over the next three years.

Working with Business Links, it is expected that between 2,000 and 4,000 businesses will call on its services in the first year, especially small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs)

The centre will provide a quick query-answering service; free diagnostic services and, for smaller companies, subsidised consultancies through a network of manufacturing specialists

Help will be particularly targeted at SMEs in Yorkshire Forward's key industrial "clusters". These include advanced engineering and metals; food and drink; chemicals, biosciences and digital industries taking in the electronics sector. The service will also be providing information for manufacturers on the internet through a website to be developed by next spring - which will be linked to the Centre.

Despite making up more than a fifth of the region's economy, Yorkshire and Humber's manufacturing sector ranks among the UK's poorest in terms of labour productivity, wages and research and development activity.

The centre's aim will be to help firms to increase their productivity and their ability to compete in the globally-competitive marketplace.

It will also support the Regional Economic Strategy's commitment to increase the commercial exploitation of the region's research base, particularly through its ten universities.

Plans are afoot for the centre to include equipment or technology demonstration services and a technology brokerage service to enable companies to "buy time" on expensive high-tech equipment.

The plan has received the blessing of Trade and Industry Secretary Patricia Hewitt. She said: "I very much hope that the practical hands-on advice and support that the Centre will offer will help local manufacturing firms in the region become major league success stories."