During construction, Universal hopes to create 20,000 jobs, with a peak of about 5,000 workers on site.
It estimates that 80% of these jobs will come from Bedford, central Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes.
The company does not expect to have difficulty filling these positions and is working to ensure jobs are available for local people.
Mr Thompson said: “We will work with all the local colleges, universities and schools to try to make sure we can help develop the skills we need to attract these people.
“The reason we went to Kimberley College and Bedford College for our public meetings was to highlight how we want to work with these and other institutions to develop degree programs that help create jobs.
“We have done a lot of research into both the number of people during the construction period and the number of people during operation, and we believe that in and around Bedford and the surrounding boroughs we will have no difficulty attracting that number of people.”
He said half of the Orlando-based management team started as hourly workers and there would be similar career development opportunities for young people in Bedford.
