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More and more people worldwide learn German. This positive trend becomes especially apparent in China (117,000 learners), in India (154,000 learners) and in Brazil (134,000 learners). Thereby, the number of German learners in China has even more than doubled within a period of five years.

Immigrants perform worse in the labor market than natives, likely because of the low transferability of home-country professional certificates. The standardized recognition of professional certificates in the host country represents one policy for increasing their transferability.This paper investigates the effects of a large recognition reform in Germany on the labor market outcomes of non-EU immigrants.

At the moment, a lot of refugees fleeing from war and persecution are desperate to get to Germany. On the one hand, it is a great challenge. On the other hand, it is a great opportunity: Germany can offer the refugees a safe haven and at the same time enable them to get qualified and enter the labor market.

Refugees are increasingly succeeding in integrating into the German labour market. Particularly female refugees benefit from improved recognition and training opportunities for their qualifications in the teaching and health care sectors.

According to data published today by the Federal Statistical Office, more and more applications for professional recognition are being filed in. In 2017, some 25,000 new applications were submitted (a 9 percent increase over the previous year) and 21,800 qualifications were recognized (a 14 percent increase over the previous year). Since the Recognition Act came into effect in 2012, some 111,500 applications for the recognition of foreign professional qualifications were submitted, the Federal Statistical Office reports.

The German companies benefit from increase in recognition of foreign professional qualifications. The Federal Statistical Office reports a 20% increase over the previous year. This is a particularly important signal in times of skills shortages.

The report was adopted by the Federal Government on 11 December 2019 and subsequently submitted to the German Bundestag. The complete report is now also available in an English version and can be downloaded as a PDF document or ordered as a printed version.