Nuremberg: Germany welcomed on Monday the first of some 20,000 foreign computer experts it hopes will take up new work permits to plug a skills gap despite a new wave of xenophobia. While Germany is gradually waking up to the fact its economy desperately needs immigrants to support an increasingly greying population, the country is also battling a rising tide of racism and right-wing violence.Labour Minister Walter Riester handed over the first US-style Green Card to Harianto Wijaya, a 25-year-old Indonesian who has just graduated in with top grades from the technology university in the western German town of Aachen. "We have an enormous need for qualified workers," Riestersaid.
The new scheme marks the first time Germany has formally opened its doors to economic immigrants since it invited "guest workers" from Turkey and other parts of southern Europe to help rebuild its economy after World War Two.
"I feel great," Wijaya, who has studied information technology in Germany for the last five years, told Reuters. "The work climate is good and the Germans are very nice." He said he had never experienced racism in Germany. "Aachenis a great city and there is no xenophobia there," he said.
Many of those migrants faced hostility when they stayed on and raised families and Helmut Kohl's conservative Christian Democrats insisted during the 16 years they held power until 1998 that Germany was not open to immigrants despite having more than seven million foreign residents. Under the new scheme, Germany plans to issue work visas valid for five years to some 20,000 information technology experts. Applicants must have a university qualification or the promise of a salary of at least 100,000 marks ($50,000) a year.
Business wants more skilled immigrants
Business wants even more. Dieter Hundt, president of the Federation of German Employers, says Germany lacks some 1.5 million skilled workers and has called for Green Cards for other sectors and an overhaul of immigration laws.
A European Union document based on a UN survey says the bloc should admit up to 75 million immigrants over the next 50 years to avert dramatic falls in their populations. Germany's federal statistics office said last week that even if 200,000 more people come to Germany than leave each year until 2050, the population would still drop by 12 million. But the government is treading carefully and knows immigration is no vote winner. A poll published earlier this month in Die Woche weekly showed that 63 percent of those asked thought Germany did not need any more immigrants.
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