WHERE are new jobs in Nottingham to come from? What will be the growth sectors?

These questions seem apt following a series of major corporate job losses and the recent failure of businesses in the conurbation to win a single penny from the second round of the £1.4bn Regional Growth Fund.

Indeed, despite nearly 160 bids from the East Midlands to the RGF, which replaced investment funding previously controlled by RDAs such as Emda, the only Nottingham winner out of both rounds has been the biotech company Molecular Profiles, which was awarded £1.6m in round one, helping to create 62 jobs.

One of the big losers in round two was Alliance Boots, which bid for up to £200m to develop 100 acres of unused land at its site at Beeston – the same site which the coalition Government triumphantly declared to be one of its new enterprise zones. Boots' failure with the RGF comes in the wake of a £56m cost-saving restructuring that has led to the company shedding 750 jobs from its Nottingham offices and factories – or one in ten of the company's Nottingham jobs.

This is in addition to combined losses of over 1,500 jobs by several of Nottingham's other larger corporate employers including Capital One, Experian and E.ON over the past few years.

Meanwhile, despite years of campaigning by businesses and council leaders, there are no solid moves afoot to improve business connections with the south of England by widening the A453 main southern artery into Nottingham from the M1. Nor can Network Rail provide an assurance that London-Nottingham rail travel times can be reduced to 90 minutes.

Growth in the national economy has almost flatlined and the unemployment rate in the Greater Nottingham conurbation is among the highest in the UK. As of May 2011, some 20,000 people in Greater Nottingham were claiming Jobseeker's Allowance, giving an increase in unemployment of 8.8 per cent over the previous year.

In what kinds of sectors could new jobs be created?

Two recent reports, the Nottingham Commercial Office Market Review and the Nottingham and Nottinghamshire Local Economic Assessment, contain forecasts suggesting where the economy of Greater Nottingham may be heading.

In the Nottingham Commercial Office Market Review, published earlier this year, Experian forecast that 39,000 jobs would be created in the conurbation between 2010 and 2025. The two largest employment growth areas over this period were predicted to be financial and business services and distribution, hotels and catering (both creating just below 15,000 jobs each) followed by construction (around 6000 jobs). Strong growth areas within these categories will include health and biotechnology-related jobs and ICT and digital media businesses

Smaller growth was predicted in public services, transport and communications and metals, minerals and chemicals. Most of these sectors will require new office space. The health sector, which is forecast to create 9,000 jobs in the next 15 years, is expected to exert the biggest demand for new workspace. Experian's forecasters had no good news for manufacturing or engineering, both of which were predicted to lose further jobs in the years ahead. Nottingham City Council's investment arm Invest in Nottingham largely follows Experian's forecasts by identifying Nottingham's key economic areas as the creative industries, retail, business and financial services and science and technology, including biotechnology and the green business sector.

The second report, Nottingham and Nottinghamshire Local Economic Assessment, was published by the city and county council and again drew on Experian's long-term forecasts last year. However, this report also attempted to deal with the skewing effects of the recession. The authors admitted that short-term job creation would be "muted" across all sectors as the economy recovers. But, over the next ten years, healthcare is expected to be the biggest growth area (18,000 new jobs), and mainly in social care. One can see the impact of an ageing population in this prediction. But other smaller industries, will also thrive with the right support, said the report. "Currently smaller sectors such as environmental technologies; creative industries and science and technology are forecast to grow rapidly," it said. "Nottingham and Nottinghamshire could capitalise upon these in the medium to long term with attention now to maximise potential for growth."

The report further saw that the priority job-creation areas would be advanced manufacturing, science and technology, green/environmental technologies, creative and digital, business services and finance. Although these sectors all tend to be part of the high value, high-skill "knowledge economy", the report acknowledges that they have the capacity to create jobs among what it calls "low skilled groups" – retail, business services, construction and health.

Is it already possible to see the glimmers of recovery and future job creation in any of these areas today? The "green collar' economy, for example, is regularly touted as a source of hope for the future and Nottingham City Council is about to put in a bid to host the new Green Investment Bank when it is finally set up next year. If successful, the bank's presence would draw other green businesses and private investment houses into Nottingham's nascent Southside business zone. Even without the bank, some 61,000 people in 3,300 businesses are reportedly already employed across the East Midlands in areas such as low-carbon technology, renewable energy and waste-to-energy. Developments in this sector have been spurred on by local spending within the private sector, local authorities and higher education and have largely bucked economic trends, buoyed up by investment in green technologies from central Government.

For example, next year's Government-backed Green Deal retrofitting scheme could create 172 jobs in the region, according to the Energy Saving Trust. A new incubator unit for green technology start-ups is currently being developed off Ilkeston Road by private sector investors. And a planned renewable energy business park in Bulwell, which may be built and run in a partnership between the city council and the private sector, could create and attract 500 jobs – if it is filled to capacity. In its 2011 Nottingham property market predictions King Sturge said that the "green agenda" would also help drive office demand by the public sector and corporates – a good example of this being Miller Birch's development of new E.ON offices in Burton Street, which, in turn, is also providing work in construction. A report into the size of Nottingham's green business sector, written by Dutch consultancy Buck Consultants International and commissioned by the city council, is currently being studied. Its findings will feed into Invest in Nottingham's actions next year.

According to the forecasters another growth area will be biotechnology, which is already anchored at the highly successful BioCity, where some 700 people are now employed in over 70 companies. Growth in the local digital and creative media sector will also draw on a solid base including the Antenna training centre, myriad small digital design companies and the presence of a handful of video game design studios including Monumental Games and Crytek. Last year UK consumers bought 63m console and PC video games –more than one title per person.

Leisure and hospitality, regarded by Experian as one of the main employment growth areas, is already changing the landscape with the presence of several new hotels in the city. A 218-room Radisson Blu opened at East Midlands Airport last month and a new 200-room hotel is also being built by the University of Nottingham on the University Park campus.

But retail? Capital Shopping Centres, for one, has predicted that over 2,000 new jobs will be created at the Victoria Centre if its plans to expand the centre get the green light from the city council. Yet retail employment follows growth in other areas and when people don't have money to spare then retail suffers – ask Comet and Best Buy.

Joshua Bamfield, a retail analyst who runs the Centre for Retail Research, said: "Experian is right to forecast growth in retail but they're probably being a bit ambitious in their figures. But there will be growth now that Capital Shopping Centres [which announced it was buying the Broadmarsh from Westfield on the day of this conversation] wants to expand the Victoria Centre. This will create more retail jobs, create more demand and also create employment in construction. But there is competition for retail from online sales and retail itself will not solve Nottingham's problems.

"A few years ago Nottingham City Council said that retail was one of the city's big growth areas, but people are more cautious now because they don't have the money. No longer do people of a certain age say, 'Which shopping centre shall we go to this week?'"

Bamfield forecasts that shop sales will be up this Christmas – but flat next year.

Retailers take note.