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In Germany thanks to the three central information portals for recognition of foreign professional qualifications, “BQ-Portal”, “Recognition in Germany” and “anabin”, there is a wide range of information on the recognition process. From now on, the new project “ProRecognition” aims to offer also in other countries comprehensive information on the possibilities of having foreign qualifications recognised in Germany.
On September 14, The Federal Statistical Office published the statistics on the Recognition Act for the reference year 2016. Since the Act came into effect in 2012, 86,514 applications for the recognition of foreign professional qualifications were filed, the Federal Statistical Office reports. In 2016, 23,028 new applications were submitted. This is a 14 percent increase over the previous year. The share of those who received a positive ruling is very high. The made up 76,5 percent of all applicants in 2016. In 66,4 percent of cases (19,845 cases), full recognition was granted and in 10,1 percent the partial one. 20,2 percent of applicants have to complete a formalized additional training in order to be able to work in their profession. Only in 3,4 percent of cases, no equivalence could be established between a credential obtained abroad and a corresponding German qualification.
Germany has become an attractive destination for immigrants again. This is especially true for young, well-trained professionals from the EU, the Advisory Board of German Foundations on Migration and Integration has found in its latest annual review.
Twelve months after the BQ information portal for foreign professional qualifications first went online, the Federal Minister of Economics and Technology, Dr. Philipp Rösler, looked back on a successful year and stressed that additional support should be provided to companies wanting to have foreign qualifications recognised.
In recognition of its brilliant public achievements, the BQ-Portal gets into the final for the European Public Sector Award. The European Public Sector Award (EPSA) was launched to identify particularly innovative and successful projects. This award is aimed to encourage administrative agencies throughout Europe to learn from the best practices of others and to modernize their structures.
The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) has evaluated the recognition of foreign professional qualifications in 2020. Overall, 5% more foreign vocational qualifications were recognised as fully or partially equivalent in 2020 than in the previous year.
The German Employment Act defines which training and professional qualifications are necessary for non-EU citizens to take up employment in Germany. The German government has now amended this law, and the new version is scheduled to come into effect on 1 July, marking an important step towards an even more welcoming culture in Germany.
The applicants willing to have their foreign credentials recognised must bear the costs of the recognition procedure. They must meet the costs for an application, translations, certified copies, and if necessary for a qualification analysis, as well as an additional training.
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.