CHRIS MARTIN, the English- born chief executive of Cork wholesale grocery group Musgrave, was in Downing Street on Tuesday for the launch by David Cameron of the “Feeding Britain’s Future” initiative.

The aim is to offer skills training in the food and grocery sectors to 10,000 young people who are either unemployed or have dropped out of education.

The programme starts on Monday.

Budgens, one of the retail chains operated by Musgrave in Britain (Londis is the other), is offering 33 places to participants who will be offered CV workshops and full-week placements by various retailers.

Britain is an important market for Musgrave, accounting for roughly one-third of its sales – €1.5 billion in 2011.

Martin told me that he was “delighted” to give young people a “leg up on the ladder of employment”.

“We think it’s an important initiative at a time when it is simply unacceptable to have more than 1 million young people out of work and out of education.”