In 2023, the Netherlands experienced a high influx of asylum seekers, so high that large sites for temporary emergency accommodation were built in several places in the Netherlands. In early 2023, a large emergency reception site was opened in Nijmegen, housing 1,200 asylum seekers in a large tent. In total in 2023 about 2200 asylum seekers where hosted in Nijmegen and close to Nijmegen. Because of this specific situation in Nijmegen, the Share Your Skills project focused on this group of migrants in Nijmegen to give the chance to get to know the Dutch labour market at a very early stage. In Bielefeld in Germany the situation was different to the situation in Nijmegen In Bielefeld we wanted to recruit migrants who had already reached a certain language level (A2 and above) to participate in the project, so that they would receive an overview of training, work and qualification opportunities in their chosen sector through the individual activities, gain an insight into a German company and, if possible, decide to work in an occupational field with a shortage of skilled workers. Immigrant citizens are also given a sense of welcome and experience that they are valuable to the labour market. All participants had a residence permit.
In both the Netherlands and Germany, the shortage of skilled workers has been a major problem for some time. In some sectors, the situation is particularly serious. In the Netherlands and Germany alike, there is a clear shortage of skilled workers in nursing, gastronomy and warehouse logistics. Politicians, especially in Germany, are striving to use immigration to alleviate the shortage of skilled workers. To support this effort, we developed the project idea for "Share your Skills". From the outset, the project aimed to support immigrant citizens in the Netherlands and Germany in their professional orientation and, if possible, to win them over for a professional activity in a sector particularly affected by the shortage of skilled workers. In this way, immigrants are shown career opportunities with prospects and companies are offered new employees to reduce the shortage of skilled workers.