A £17m National Lottery scheme will create more than 800 training places on UK heritage projects.
Trainees will learn crafts such as blacksmithing, boat building and dry stonewalling in an attempt to preserve traditional skills, the BBC has reported.
Modern skills such as digital archiving and the use of social media to bring heritage sites alive for visitors will also feature.
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The grant is three times as much as expected, and the training placements will be spread across 54 different projects, including the Sheffield Wildlife Trust, the National Waterways Museum, and conservation projects in Northern Ireland.
Dame Jenny Abramsky, chair of the Heritage Lottery Fund, said: “When the recession kicked in, we thought very hard about how the Heritage Lottery Fund could make a difference to people’s lives at a time of real need. The answer was an innovative and ambitious programme focusing on equipping people with practical skills to help them secure future employment. The response clearly shows a great hunger for training within our sector.”
