2024-07-12 14:21:18
Croatia has a growing need to import labor, so it is expected that by the end of this year, over 200,000 requests from employers to hire foreigners will arrive, Croatian TV HRT reported, quoted by BTA. Foreigners now make up 40 percent of the total workforce in construction, and their share is also increasing in tourism and trade. There are currently 135,000 foreign workers working in Croatia, most of them from neighboring countries – Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Around 30,000 foreign workers in Croatia come from Nepal, India and the Philippines. All of them already make up 40 percent of the total construction workforce.
“We estimate that this year there will be somewhere between 50,000 and 55,000 foreign workers from third countries. Last year around 46,000 permits were issued, so the trend is rising,” Velko Ostoic, head of the Croatian Tourist Association, told HRT. “Companies that hire foreign workers face many challenges. Mostly of an integration nature,” said a director of a company where foreign workers make up half of the employees.
“One of the key factors is the language barrier, at one point we had as many as six translators in the company,” said Dragutin Kamenski, owner of a construction company.