Procedures for the Assessment of Qualifications Acquired Abroad in Transition
Although Germany can look back on a decades-long history of immigration, the subject of the accreditation (or ‘recognition’/in German: Anerkennung) of qualifications that have been acquired abroad has been given increasing attention only in roughly the last five years. The issue is becoming volatile because of demographic changes which will in the future only increase the shortage of skilled workers that is already noticeable in Germany and other European countries. According to the calculations of the Cologne Institute for Economic Research [German acronym: IW], in 2011 there was already a shortage of over 158,000 highly qualified workers, particularly in the industrial sector of the MINT professions.
