Germany confuses between refugee crises, lack of well-trained manpower

By: Hani Daniel

Germany continues in its attempts to take advantage of the refugees and immigrants capabilities, despite the difficulties surrounding German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who often indicate the Berlin needing to the competent well-trained manpower, to meet the shortage of this type of skills.

Analysts believe that the European Blue Card may be an appropriate gateway to developing solutions to address these crises and to organize the process of issuing it, as the American “Green Card”, as it allows its holders of non-nationals of the European Union to work and stay in EU countries except Denmark, Britain, and Ireland.

Observers note that the legal ground for this card is the legal order issued by the Council of the European Union in 2009. In order to implement this order, Germany issued in 2012 a special law to issue the card and attract the manpower needed by highly qualified in specific qualify. This law includes the conditions that must be met for those wishing to obtain the Blue Card, as the recognized university certificate in Germany and an annual salary of not less than 50,800 euros.

It is reported that some professions, jobs, and specialties such as informatics, mathematics, natural sciences, and medicine, which suffer from a severe shortage in the number of a qualified person, have to reach an annual salary 39624 euros, to help their practitioners from having the card.

The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees in Germany has announced some figures recently and mentioned that 11034 Blue Cards have been issued during the first half of 2017 their holders got jobs. It seems that the card is becoming more popular and the number of people wishing to get it from Germany has increased, with 17,362 cards being issued in 2016. Compared to the first half of 2017 and 2016, there is an increase of 25 percent, and in 2013, the card was issued in Germany by 11,290 people from outside the European Union.

The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees also conducted a study on the Blue Card; the results were satisfactory, according to the head of the office, Frank Juergen Faizet. “The study showed that Germany offers attractive migration possibilities for highly qualified people,” he said.

During the study, the office conducted an opinion poll of 4,340 people who hold the blue card and obtained a job, according to the survey, 89 of whom have this card worked in the fields of engineering, natural sciences, informatics, and medicine. About a third said they intend to settle permanently in Germany, while 39 percent want to stay at least 10 years and only 22 percent want to stay between five and 10 years.

The German newspaper Rheinsche Post reported according to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, that 22.8 percent of the cardholders came from India, in the second rank China, Russia, Ukraine, and Syria.  During her visit to training refugees’ school on programming, the German Chancellor said that refugees can contribute to fill the shortage of skilled labor in information technology.

Angela Merkel has confirmed that refugees can contribute to reducing the shortage of specialized labor in Germany and she confirmed during her visit to the Refugee Programming School in Berlin: “Germany needs information technology in every specialized employment; this means that jobs are available in these fields.

“Of course we have to solve a range of problems,” Merkel said, referring to the significant progress in many areas in the effort to integrate refugees with opportunities to stay here,” she said.

Volunteer experts at the ReDI School of Digital Integration have been providing training to refugees since February 2016 in computer programming and provide students with ways to connect with large and emerging companies to facilitate their careers. This charity school is funded by various companies. Most of the school’s 135 students now come from Syria. The school also includes refugees from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Eritrea. Some of these students are already working in companies or have established their own companies.