For citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina, but also of the entire Western Balkans, Germany is a promised land. Interest in working and living in Germany has not declined for decades, but has increased from time to time, as is the case now after the Bundestag passed a new set of immigration laws.
The law is expected to come into force in three and a half months (March 1st), aimed at facilitating the arrival of skilled labor from countries outside the European Union. Germany, said Chancellor Angela Merkel, lacks nearly one million skilled workers.
New German law will encourage old problems with departures and emigration. The World Bank recently released worrying data that nearly half of our population has left our country so far. It is indicative that 55 percent of the highly qualified personnel are among those who left.
Given the excellent conditions offered by individual countries in the European Union, especially Germany, it is logical that the dramatic trend will continue. Macroeconomic analyst Faruk Hadzic told Dnevni Avaz that our country is threatened by the real exodus of the population and that it is becoming a national problem.
“It has been publicly pointed on this, that BiH has been empty for a long time, we are left without a skilled workforce,” says Hadzic at the beginning. He points out that the ratio of workers to the total workforce has deteriorated to some 82.5 percent.
“It’s the result of the emigration. In five years, BiH has lost 113,000 workers. Eurostat official data shows that in those five years, 155,000 BiH citizens were granted residence permits in EU countries, only about 55,000 in the past year alone,” Hadzic explains. He points out that out of 55 thousand 16 thousand went to Germany.
“Germany is the country most of our citizens go to, and I am afraid that with the implementation of the new immigration law it will increase even more. Easier entry into Germany, unstable political situation in BiH, no one here understands what a what problems we will face in the future,” adds Hadzic.
The highest demand in Germany is in the services sector, followed by construction and healthcare. Workers with a high school diploma are most in-demand, but there is still a strong demand for engineers in the chemical, mechanical and civil engineering sectors. At the same time, demand for unskilled workers is growing.
