GLOBAL COMPETITION FOR SKILLED WORKERS

Over the past two to three decades employment growth in the industrialized countries has largely been in the services sector especially in the so-called “knowledge industries”. The growth has been very notable in many areas, from health and medical workers to professionals in financial services, hotels and tourism, to ICT engineers and computer graphics designers. Slow or negative growth rates of the labour force, ageing, and labour market rigidities caused by policies in the advanced countries have all contributed to a rise in demand for foreign skills and talents. The stakes are clearly high for all. Countries which fail to attract foreign talents and skills risk not only falling behind in the in the global competition for new intelligent products and services, but also maintaining the standards of living their populations have been used to. The current competition for the highly skilled has naturally raised alarms that it will further aggravate the problems of developing countries in creating a critical mass of professionals and technical workers needed to raise productivity in agriculture and industry, to manage public policies for more effective governance, and to expand education. Infusions of capital alone do not suffice to break out of under-development. A critical mass of native people with the skills necessary to create new knowledge or to transform imported knowledge into viable technologies for production, to design and create new products and services, and to make these competitive in the global market is an essential condition for progress. The huge investment