Andy Griffiths, deputy managing director of ProLogis UK, which has a Didcot base, explores the controversial question of employment density and quality in warehouses

The 21st century has seen a boom in large distribution buildings, with the realisation that they reduce road miles, lower costs, create less pollution and make for a more efficient operation. Yet when we seek to build, we often encounter the commonly-held view that big sheds do not create enough jobs and that the employment they do create is low calibre.

Our experience, understanding and preliminary research indicate this can be a misconception.

We need to ensure decisions regarding distribution development are based on reality, rather than on unchecked assumption.

Employment patterns are changing and the shifts affect us all. Many manufacturers have moved their operations to India and China, where cheap land, low wages and efficient shipping routes make economic sense.

More than a million manufacturing jobs have been lost in Britain since 1997, and Government investment in manufacturing has dropped by 27.6 per cent in the same period.

The mass production of general consumer goods is unlikely to return to Britain, given the global market in which all manufacturers must compete.

We need to look elsewhere for our job creation and there is no doubt that the distribution of goods, to meet customer demand for immediate delivery, increased variety, affordable fashion and freshness, is big business.

As the Mayor of London's Office has said, this vibrant consumer economy of ours could not function without efficient distribution.

Around seven per cent of British workers are employed in transport and transport-related jobs, of which 139,000 are in transport and logistics.

It is sometimes assumed that logistics operations are fully automated, requiring only the occasional forklift driver, or shelf-stacker, to work an entire warehouse. Yet distribution warehouses are operated by all sorts of people: highly-skilled and low-skilled; junior and management; trade and professional.

In a Cranfield University survey of large UK warehouses, 68 per cent of workers were classified as warehouse staff; 13 per cent as drivers; 11 per cent as administrative or support staff; seven per cent as managerial and one per cent as other'.

Newly-built business parks are carefully landscaped, often creating public access footpaths, new water features, enhanced natural habitats and other amenities.

They are pleasant and easy places to work. All these factors make the modern warehouse attractive to prospective employees and an asset for inward-investment agencies aiming to attract a new generation of employers.

We have to look at a range of factors when we describe the quality of jobs.

In terms of employment density, it is easy to see why people hark back to the high-intensity factories of the mid-20th century.

In 1954, the tyre-maker Dunlop owned 135 manufacturing and selling outlets around the world and employed 10,000 factory workers at Fort Dunlop in Birmingham.

No logistics operation can compete with that but nor can most manufacturers currently operating in Britain.

What we can say is, according to a study by the international property agent Savills, in three out of four size categories, distribution warehouses actually employ more people per square metre than B1c (offices) or B2 (manufacturing).

A survey of 33 businesses occupying ProLogis warehouses found an employment density of one person for every 95 sq m (1,023 sq ft).

Since ProLogis leased out 483,000 sq m in the UK in the 18 months to the end of 2005, this means the creation of about 5,000 jobs in 17 buildings.

Distribution warehouses are growing larger and becoming increasingly familiar, changing the landscape around motorway junctions and helping to regenerate unsightly, neglected brownfield sites around the country.

They often provide an employment opportunity for mixed-use developments which may include offices, residential, leisure, retail and parkland.

We should not assume these vast buildings, repositories of the consumer essentials on which we all depend, stand nearly empty.

Local authorities have a choice between trying to attract manufacturing and high-tech commercial activity, which may be better suited to other parts of the world, and recognising the benefits of an industry which wants to invest in the consumer markets of the UK.