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Valuing diversity: guidance for labour market integration of migrants

Executive summary

Aims and methodology

This report aims at raising awareness of the importance of guidance services for
immigrant integration into the labour market. Its main purpose is to highlight
effective guidance practices across Europe which may improve the employability
of immigrants and contribute to raising qualification levels. It addresses policy-
makers at European and national levels, organisers/managers of guidance
activities, and practitioners. The study discusses:
(a) for policy-makers, issues such as how to identify and address barriers to
quality labour market information used for migrant integration; strategies to
enable cooperation and involvement of migrant groups in the definition and
implementation of guidance policy; and how to generate accountability,
visibility and public support towards integration practice;
(b) for organisers of guidance activities, issues such as how to make innovative
practices sustainable and what type of skills and attitudes to include in the
training of practitioners;
(c) for practitioners, issues such as which attitudes, knowledge and skills they
need to provide high quality guidance to immigrants or how to engage
employers and migrant communities to achieve more effective results.

This study relies on a combination of secondary sources analysis, interviews
with national and international experts and case studies. The case studies cover
a range of services provided to immigrants in selected countries:
(a) with a tradition of receiving immigrants: cases in Belgium, Germany, France,
the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal and the United Kingdom (integrated in this
group, although it has traditionally been a country characterised by both
immigration and emigration);
(b) which have more recently entered the EU: cases in Estonia and Latvia;
(c) which evolved from emigration to immigration countries: cases in Greece,
Spain, Italy;
(d) which have recently started to have immigration mainly due to a large intake
of political refugees: cases in Sweden.

Why migrants need guidance

Projections for Europe point to a 50 million reduction in the EU population over
the next 45 years, if immigration stops, with an expected impact on the supply of

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