Skill shortages in the IT sector increased during 2008, according to new research.

Trade body the National Computing Centre (NCC) found that perceived skills shortages had increased from 6.8% to 7.9% between 2007 and 2008.

Clayton Collis, manager of IT recruiter Octopus Computer Associates, told Recruiter: “We still see good demand for SAP and Oracle and there was a strong demand from clients last year.”

The skills cited as particularly hard to source over the last year included SAP, Oracle, web development, .NET, project management, systems development and technical architects.

The study found 49% of firms expected the total number of IT staff employed at their installation to increase over the next two years. With the highest projected two-year growth rate in systems development staff at 13.1%, although the report warned recent economic events are likely to reduce this figure.