Migration, skills and labour markets: how better policy can offer a “triple win” for countries and workers
A new ETF report and working paper draw on comprehensive evidence and expert analysis, advocating labour migration policy that promotes genuine shared gains.
Labour migration remains at the heart of some of Europe’s most salient policy debates. It is intrinsically linked to many of our most pressing economic and social challenges: ageing populations, labour shortages, digital transformation, geopolitical instability, and the growing importance of skills as a driver of competitiveness. Against this backdrop, the ETF’s newly published “Skills for Fair, Efficient Labour Migration” and “Skills and Migration in Changing Labour Markets” argue that migration can help countries respond to such pressures, but only when supported by robust institutions, data, partnerships and skills systems.
At its core, the research makes a relatively simple point. Labour migration can generate benefits for all, but this does not occur automatically. Too often, migrants’ skills are underused or mismatched, countries of origin lose talent without seeing long-term gains, and destination countries fail to harness workers’ competences within their labour markets. In parallel, migrants’ professional and personal ambitions can remain unfulfilled, as their potential is overlooked. However, when skills development, labour market intelligence and migration governance are better coordinated, labour migration can offer a genuine “triple win”; for migrants, countries of origin and countries of destination.
To good use: harnessing skills, tackling “brain waste”
As both reports highlight, international mobility continues to grow, with labour migration a core driver of this. At the same time, European countries are faced with challenges like demographic decline. Ageing populations, sectoral labour shortages and the demand for workers across low-, mid-skilled and highly skilled occupations have become a prominent feature of many European labour markets. These phenomena favour labour migration and create unique challenges. Inadequate recognition of qualifications and insufficient skills matching often lead to issues like “brain waste”, for example.
Migrant populations today are, by and large, more qualified and skilled than previous generations, but skills portability is lagging. In most cases, migration frameworks amount to little more than “flow management”, and the added value of migrants’ skills is inadequately assessed and considered. As a result, many occupy jobs below their skill level. While EU initiatives like the Pact on Migration and Asylum, The Pact for the Mediterranean, Talent Partnerships, the Talent Pool, emerging work on skills portability are a step in the right direction, the reports underscore a need for coherent, long-term systems and enhanced cooperation with countries of origin to truly leverage migration’s potential.
Key Stat: In 2024, roughly 60% of the world’s 304 million international migrants were labour migrants.
Needs must: policy alignment and cooperation
Better policy alignment is the key to unlocking mutually beneficial labour migration, the reports argue. Policies around education and training, labour market demand, migration governance, and international cooperation are too often disjointed, resulting in fragmented, reactive mobility pathways. The availability of reliable comparative data is key to remedying this. Using case studies in Nigeria and Senegal, the report shows how national labour force surveys and international classifications like ISCO, ISIC and ESCO can help identify occupations, skill profiles and areas for targeted cooperation.
Adopting this approach leads to better labour shortage anticipation, the development of more relevant training systems, and migration pathways that match real labour-market demand. Skills partnerships between countries of origin and countries of destination follow a similar principle. The most successful examples examined in the report go beyond narrow, company-driven recruitment logic. They combine work-based learning, language skills, prior-learning recognition, and broader public-interest goals, such as VET system development, youth employment programmes and institutional capacity building.
Key Stat: Morocco has an estimated 3.6 million citizens living abroad, yet diaspora and national estimates vary widely. This can complicate effective migration governance and policy design.
Under pressure: crisis, resilience and adaptation
The reports also look at the structural nature of migration in countries affected by war or chronic outflows, with special attention paid to their impact on labour supply, public services and socioeconomic resilience. In Ukraine, the effects of war-induced emigration on worker availability were assessed, with an exodus of highly educated women and key professional groups highlighted in the analysis. Such phenomena expose the limits of traditional forecasting models and assert the need for “migration-aware” skills governance that integrates outflows and return scenarios from the outset.
Health sector evidence from Albania and Kosovo – where large shares of medical doctors continually consider emigration – brings this into sharper focus. These cases illustrate that push factors are not necessarily uniform from one context to another. While income and living standards are of great importance to Albania’s medical migrants, a desire for professional development and specialisation opportunities weighs more heavily in Kosovo. Instead of trying to “stop” mobility in such contexts, the reports’ authors emphasise the need for sustainable career pathways and ethical circular cooperation.
Key Stat: Between 2021 and 2023, Ukraine is estimated to have lost 18.7% of its pre-war labour force due to emigration.
Homecoming: diaspora expertise and return migration
Later in the reports, the question of diaspora engagement and return migration is addressed. Institutional contexts differ widely, but the research reveals that return migration does not necessarily generate value, nor do remittances necessarily equate to investment back home. Positive outcomes rely on local ecosystems and their capacity to facilitate skills recognition, connect returning workers to opportunities, and channel diaspora expertise into national development strategies. Türkiye is noted for its strong institutionalised diaspora engagement, but even there, such issues create bottlenecks.
Evidence from Uzbekistan also indicates the limitations of remittances and return migration in countries of origin, namely when it comes to entrepreneurship and job creation. According to the analysis, remittances and return migration to the Central Asian country are far more likely to be used for consumption smoothing and establishing household stability than for starting businesses. While this does not reduce their importance, it demonstrates how policy ambition in this regard must be coupled with reintegration support, financing opportunities and a welcoming business environment.
Key Stat: Between 2010 and 2021, Moldova’s PARE 1+1 programme supported 739 businesses and 564 direct returnees to the country, showing what effective return-migration policy can achieve.
New frontiers: digitalisation and the platform economy
Finally, the reports look to various emerging developments in migration, namely those linked to the digital economy. As work becomes more digital, more fragmented and more platform-mediated, the relationship between skills and mobility is also evolving. For many, access to international labour markets is increasingly available on a remote basis. For others, precarious forms of in situ platform work have become the norm, and with this come weak protections and low levels of skills recognition. As the reports argue, in many cases, policy has simply not kept pace with technological change.
In the Western Balkans, digital labour platforms are already reshaping mobility patterns, for example. From a positive perspective, online freelancing enables many skilled workers to participate in global labour markets while remaining at home. Such “virtual mobility” offers real developmental potential, but social protection for “platform workers” remains a concern – be it for lower-skilled, often informal activities like delivery and transport services, or indeed for digital nomads. Once again, governance is key, as digitalisation can both widen opportunity and deepen inequality, depending on context.
Key Stat: In the EU17, around 62.4% of platform workers are not covered by unemployment protection, a stark reminder that new forms of mobility can also mean new forms of precarity.
The ETF and labour migration
As the foremost European Union agency supporting partner countries to reform education, training and labour market systems, labour migration is a subject of critical importance to the ETF. Working with academics and experts in various related fields, our agency conducts applied research into how skills, labour markets and migration interact. Together, we use comparative data and case studies (from our partner countries and beyond) to identify trends, challenges and effective practices. This is consistent with the ETF’s evidence-based policy advisory role for both the EU institutions and our partners, across various fields. These latest reports were co-authored by 45 specialists and experts. They were presented at the Research forum for Evidence-based Policies on Skills and Migration in Brussels on 9-10 June 2026.
Download both reports for in-depth access to detailed evidence, country insights and key policy conclusions:
Join the ETF international community of skills and migration experts (MIGCOM) by signing up here.
For general enquiries about the reports, or the ETF’s work in relation to skills and migration, please contact migration-team@etf.europa.eu
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