8 minutes of help with training for refugees in Germany

Wars and crises in countries such as Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan have led to more and more people coming to Germany over the past ten years to seek protection and build a new future for themselves. The majority of the 1.7 million refugees are of working age, and 60 percent of them are even under 30 years old (BIBB, 2019). Finding young refugees training and jobs is therefore a key task of German integration work.
One in ten companies now employs refugees as trainees. However, for many of these companies, this also brings new challenges. For example, more than 90 percent of companies cite a lack of German language skills as an obstacle to the training process. Companies also find it difficult that many refugees first have to get used to the new working environment. The majority of companies also find the additional support effort to be too high (Pierenkemper & Heuer, 2020). In order not to leave companies alone with the integration of refugees into the labor market, there are numerous public support measures. However, these are not always specifically tailored to the needs of refugees, and 60 percent of companies state that the offers do not match their requirements (Pierenkemper & Heuer, 2020).