Given the ever-growing skills shortage across the globe, it is small wonder that many governments are scrambling to liberalise immigration policies – while adopting programmes aimed at upskilling indigenous populations – in a bid to solve the problem. David Sapsted reports.


A


recent nation-by-nation analysis by global management consulting firm Korn Ferry forecast


that, by 2030, the planet would face a talent shortage of more than 85 million people, representing a loss of about $8.5 trillion in revenues per year. Other estimates have put the


skills shortage in Europe, the Middle East and Africa at 14 million-plus by 2030, and this when job vacancies in the United States currently exceed 9.9 million while the total of unemployed Americans stands at 5.8 million. Faced with ageing populations and falling fertility rates,


nations around the world are beginning to respond. Recently, Germany committed itself to creating “Europe’s most modern immigration regime” amid fears that the worsening skills shortage would become a “real brake on economic growth”. Labour Minister Hubertus Heil


told the Financial Times that many industries were “desperate” for staff and that the situation would only get worse as baby-boomers retired. “Germany will lack 7 million


workers by 2035 if we don’t do something. And that could end up being a real brake on our economic growth,” he said. Similarly, the Australian


government announced a far-reaching overhaul of its immigration system in late April to make it easier for skilled workers to get visas. “If ‘populate or perish’ described


Australia’s challenge in the 1950s, ‘skill up or sink’ is the reality we face in the 2020s and beyond,” said Clare O’Neill, the Home Affairs minister. Such a sentiment was already


a familiar theme in Canada where boosting immigration has been a prime target since Justin Trudeau came to power in 2015. Last year, there was an unprecedented net


increase in the Canadian


population of more than a million, the bulk of it down to immigration.


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THINK GLOBAL PEOPLE IMMIGRATION


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