The State of Israel must decide whether it wants “its hi-tech jobs in Bnei Brak or Kiev,” Jerusalem Ventures Partners founder and executive chairman Erel Margalit warned on Wednesday.Addressing the Haredi Hi-Tech Conference in Jerusalem, Margalit cautioned that failing to implement a strategy for integrating Israel’s growing ultra-Orthodox community into the hi-tech workforce will see “hundreds of thousands of development jobs leaving Israel for Kiev in Ukraine.”While the local hi-tech sector employs more than 300,000 workers today, a recent study by the Israel Innovation Authority and Start-Up Nation Central revealed that Israel’s tech innovation sector is growing faster than the local supply of talent, leading to a shortage of approximately 15,000 skilled workers needed to fill open positions.“The State of Israel will need to set a national goal of training 100,000 ultra-Orthodox workers during the next decade” to avoid outsourcing jobs to countries including Ukraine and India, Margalit told the conference organized by Bizmax.“For us in the hi-tech industry, it is more profitable to export the jobs to Ukraine, but we are not just businessman – we are also Israeli Zionists who care about Israeli society,” he said, citing the important role of the ultra-Orthodox community in Israel’s engine of economic growth.Jerusalem Ventures Partners, founded in 1993 by Margalit, manages funds worth $1.4 billion, establishing more than 140 companies and completing 35 exits to date, including 12 Nasdaq IPOs. According to the venture-capital fund, its investments have assisted the creation of more than 20,000 jobs in Jerusalem.“The hi-tech industry cannot be alone in this story – everyone has to join forces: the government, industry and ultra-Orthodox society,” Margalit said, citing a list of measures that must be immediately advanced by the government to hit the target of 100,000 workers.if(window.location.pathname.indexOf("656089") != -1){console.log("hedva connatix");document.getElementsByClassName("divConnatix")[0].style.display ="none";}Measures include the formation of short and intensive training courses based on the IDF’s Mamram training model, offering long-term financial incentives to employers and supporting higher-education institutions that offer technology courses for the ultra-Orthodox.According to figures published in August 2019 by the Labor Ministry, employment among ultra-Orthodox women has increased significantly in recent years, with approximately 76% now employed, just below the high national average of 78.3%. Among ultra-Orthodox men, however, only 50.2% are employed.At the lower extreme of the socioeconomic spectrum, the ultra-Orthodox Bnei Brak neighborhood of Ramat Elhanan (West), with a population of 1,137 residents, was designated as Israel’s least-advantaged area. Other neighborhoods among Israel’s least advantaged included Kiryat Harama in Ramat Beit Shemesh, Mea She’arim in Jerusalem and Kiryat Degel Hatorah in Modi’in Illit, all home to ultra-Orthodox populations.“The success of a city is derived from no shortage of parameters,” Jerusalem Development Authority CEO Eyal Haimovsky told The Jerusalem Post. “Yet there is no doubt that a population residing in the city that isn’t productive, and which relies on municipal resources without contributing to its productivity, is a significant weight to bear.”Recent increases in ultra-Orthodox workforce participation will greatly benefit the city of Jerusalem, he said.“You can see it in rising household incomes within the ultra-Orthodox sector and a corresponding rise in household expenditure,” Haimovsky said.