Brussels, Belgium / RankWire.AI / – Research from Eurofound reveals that European Union member states are unlikely to reach their combined goal of 20 million ICT specialists by 2030 without significant policy reforms. Confirmed by Emirates News Agency, the EU is projected to miss its 2030 ICT workforce target by 5 million due to ongoing deficiencies in local training systems. The report indicates that primary and vocational education programs across Europe are lagging behind enterprise demands for specialized digital skills, resulting in severe labor shortages that companies are attempting to bridge through hiring skilled workers outside the EU.
Despite this anticipated shortfall, total employment figures within Europe’s digital sector have shown consistent long-term growth over the past decade. Eurofound’s data shows that the number of ICT specialists in the EU increased from 5.6 million in 2011 to 10.3 million in 2024, a rise of 81 percent. During the same period, ICT professionals’ share of total employment in Europe grew from 3 percent to 5 percent. Nevertheless, sector growth rates of 7 percent to 8 percent annually remain below the level needed to bridge the gap toward the 20 million mark established by European policymakers for the end of this decade.
Significant regional disparities still exist across EU countries regarding technology employment. Eurofound’s report highlights that in 2024, ICT specialists represented 8.6 percent of total employment in Sweden, 8 percent in Luxembourg, and 7.8 percent in Finland. Conversely, digital specialists made up just 2.5 percent of the workforce in Greece and 2.8 percent in Romania. Growth patterns also varied significantly, with Estonia more than doubling its share of ICT workers from 3.4 percent to 7.2 percent between 2011 and 2024, while other member states saw minimal percentage increases over the same timeframe.
Educational Infrastructure Gaps Fuel Dependence on International Talent
Surveys of businesses across the EU reveal that in 2024, 57 percent of companies looking to fill IT roles faced severe recruitment challenges. The most acute shortages are found in senior engineering roles and specialized fields such as cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, generative AI, and cloud infrastructure. To address these gaps, technology firms have increasingly relied on global talent pools, leading to an increase in ICT specialists born outside the EU from 9.2 percent in 2021 to 11.9 percent in 2024.
Gender imbalance remains a key obstacle to expanding the EU’s digital workforce. Eurofound noted that in 2024, women made up fewer than one in five ICT specialists across the 27 EU countries, accounting for 19 percent of the total. Furthermore, in 2022, gender pay disparities in the broader information and communications sector approached 20 percent, which is higher than the economy-wide average of 13 percent. The underrepresentation of women limits the potential of the European tech industry, effectively operating with less than three quarters of its digital talent capacity and reducing diversity of thought in technological innovation.
Core Software and Consulting Sectors Exhibit Steady Growth but Cannot Alone Address Labor Shortages
The report emphasized that, although ICT roles tend to offer higher-than-average pay, advanced training, and better employment conditions, these factors alone are insufficient to overcome the structural skills gap. As EU is projected to fall short of the 2030 ICT target by 5 million workers, analysts stressed that closing this gap requires coordinated policy measures aimed at boosting domestic educational capacities and facilitating labor mobility within the EU. The study incorporated quantitative data alongside insights from the Network of Eurofound Correspondents and professional analyses provided by LinkedIn Economic Graph.
European policymakers and industry leaders are under increasing pressure to reform national vocational training programs to better align with the needs of the future digital economy. Eurofound concluded that neglecting domestic training deficiencies will heighten reliance on external talent sources, threatening broader EU digital transformation ambitions. Authorities are actively reviewing workforce strategies to expand local training initiatives, improve female participation in technical fields, and maintain competitiveness in the global tech industry.