UK businesses will suffer if they cut back on graduate recruitment, according to Leeds-based accountants Grant Thornton.
Managing partner Jonathan Riley warns that such a short-sighted policy risks businesses becoming stale, unimaginative and uncompetitive.
He said: "Lots of companies are cutting their graduate schemes and training, and I think that is a very short-sighted approach.
"You need people who bring a fresh perspective: well-educated individuals who can bring passion and more radical and un-cynical views on life."
He said that newcomers are often the ones who can see how things can be made to work better, and that new blood can help prevent other employees becoming bored.
He said: "People want to be stimulated in terms of what they're doing in the workplace, and to do that you've got to allow progression by bringing new people in at the bottom."
Grant Thornton is one of the UK's leading business and financial advisers, with 30 offices and 40,000 clients nationwide.
