Making greater use of labor force potential in rural areas

Skills shortages are a widely discussed issue. They are more pronounced in rural areas than in agglomerations. In his contribution to the current issue of LandInForm, Jan Cornelius Peters discusses how skill shortages in rural areas (and beyond) could be reduced if potential workers were more actively targeted and better integrated into the labor market.

Among other things, he discusses that

1. older workers in rural areas have recently left the workforce earlier than their counterparts in cities, although retaining older workers in the labor market is particularly important for rural regions,
2. while the labor force participation of women has increased in rural areas as well, regional differences remain – indicating untapped potential – as well as a high proportion of part-time employment in rural areas,
3. the opportunities offered by digitalization are, in some cases, even greater in rural areas than in urban areas; however, taking advantage of these opportunities requires, among other things, increased further training – something that companies in rural areas tend to offer only rarely,
4. the proportion of low-skilled workers has risen sharply and the apprenticeship market has yet to recover from the downturn caused by the pandemic, even though the (unmet) demand for skilled workers with vocational qualifications is high, especially in rural regions.

The June issue of LandInForm can be found here and further information on the project “Regional patterns of skills shortages and their causes” here.

Contact: Jan Cornelius Peters