Skills and Labour Market Integration of Immigrants and their Children in Norway

1. Assessment and recommendations for immigrant integration in Norway

Abstract

This chapter summarises the findings and recommendations of the OECD review of Norway’s immigrant integration system. It outlines how Norway’s highly skilled labour market requires newcomers especially those with lower qualification to upskill, and how Norway invests heavily into labour market preparation of humanitarian arrivals. The chapter argues that many of the recent reforms in integration policy go in the right direction but that the increased number of stakeholders requires national oversight, long-term follow-up, and efficient co‑ordination. It also draws attention to the needs of some specific groups including EU and higher-skilled migrants, migrant mothers, and native‑born offspring of immigrants.

This report was largely completed before the Russian aggression against Ukraine. Norway swiftly adapted its integration framework to accommodate for the specific challenges arising from the inflow of refugees from Ukraine. These measures are discussed in a separate chapter (Chapter 6).

Assessment and recommendations

Norway has a rapidly growing foreign-born population, and most recent immigration has been via free mobility

In 2020, about 16% of the population of Norway were foreign-born, up from just 6.5% in 2000. Among OECD countries, only Spain, Italy and Iceland had similar increases in the share of the foreign-born. Free mobility has accounted for the bulk of new arrivals to Norway, accounting for about 57% of arrivals over the past 15 years. At the same time, Norway is also a longstanding destination for humanitarian migrants and the majority of immigrants from outside of the EU have arrived either as humanitarian migrants or family of humanitarian migrants.

Norway has high overall employment rates, skills and qualification levels – raising the question of the adequate benchmark for integration

Like its Scandinavian neighbours, Norway has an extensive social welfare system. In 2019, it recorded the second-highest amount of social expenditure per head in the OECD. The welfare model is dependent on high employment for both genders and, at almost 80% and 75% for men and women, respectively, in Q3‑2021, the country has among the highest employment rates for both genders among OECD countries. Norway’s population is also characterised by high skills and qualification levels in international comparison – which raises the question of what outcomes of immigrants, who have been raised and educated in a very different context, would be considered a success.

Norway’s knowledge‑intense labour market calls for high skills, but many immigrants are low-educated

Only about 3.5% of employment in Norway is in elementary occupations, and 9% in low-skilled jobs. These are, on both accounts, the lowest OECD-wide. At the same time, more than half of all employment in Norway is classified as high skilled jobs – one of the highest shares in the OECD. About half of the low-skilled jobs are done by immigrants, and about one in ten immigrants work in low-skilled employment. Among native‑born, this share is less than 2%. Projections on future labour market demand indicate that employers demand for high-skilled workers will continue to increase whilst the demand for low-skilled workers will be significantly lower.

At the same time, a significant share of immigrants from non-EU countries is low-educated (27% of non-EU-born vs. 17.5% for the native‑born), and a full 5% of these immigrants did not go beyond primary education. While these figures are even higher in many other European OECD countries, they are of particular concern in the context of the highly skilled labour market.

To overcome this challenge, Norway invests heavily into integration…

To ensure that new arrivals have the necessary skills for sustainable labour market integration, Norway boasts – similar to its Scandinavian neighbours – a comprehensive Introduction Programme for new arrivals (NIP). Since 2021, its duration lasts full-time from three months to up to four years and consists of training, work practice, language and social introduction courses. Along with the flexibilisation brought be the 2021 reform, there has also been a stronger focus on upskilling and individualised support.

…and the resulting outcomes are good, at least initially

While overall employment rates of immigrants are high in international comparison (at 76% and 66% for men and women, respectively), there is a strong disparity in the outcomes between EU immigrants and non-EU migrants. Whereas the former have overall employment rates above those of the native‑born, there are large gaps for the latter. This especially holds for women, who face a gap of more than 17 percentage points compared with their native peers. Still, as most non-EU migrants are refugees and their families, the rates are not unfavourable. In particular, the early outcomes of refugees are relatively high – by the end of 2020, more than half of all refugees who arrived in 2015 were in employment and a further 16% were in education or labour measures.

While initial outcomes of refugees and their family are favourable, the improvement process comes to a sudden stop after about 6‑7 years for men and somewhat later and more gradually for women. The decline for men is both earlier and stronger than what is observed elsewhere, suggesting that sustainability of employment is an issue – and improving both skills levels and job quality are important elements in addressing this.

The pandemic introduced a new context and revealed challenges for integration, but targeted relief measures cushioned the shock against integration…

The COVID‑19 pandemic initially disproportionally affected immigrants’ employment and living conditions. Among other challenges, the pandemic resulted in a strong drop in employment among immigrants and almost doubling of their unemployment rate from 5% in the 4th quarter of 2019 to 9% in the 4th quarter of 2020, more than three times the increase among native‑born.

In response to the pandemic, the parliament adopted temporary relief schemes. One measure was prolonged unemployment benefits and the possibility to combine training and educational measures with unemployment benefits, both of which tend to disproportionately benefit migrants. The government also introduced significant changes to integration policy – notably an extension of the maximum duration of Norway’s Introduction Programme (NIP) and a right to extended Norwegian language training. These measures seem to have succeeded in cushioning the effects of the crisis, and by the fourth quarter, of 2021, employment rates were higher than pre‑crisis level but the number of unemployed immigrants were still higher than before the pandemic.

…and coincided with the implementation of one of the largest reforms of integration policy in the last 20 years

Assessing integration policy at the moment is particularly challenging, not only because of the challenges induced by the pandemic but also because of a number of significant changes related to integration policy. The revised NIP aims to provide more flexible and differentiated offers with “tailor-made” goals in an integration plan, which is adjusted to the participant’s educational background and objectives. To that end, duration is now flexible and lasts from three months to up to four years for participants who have the goal of completing upper secondary education. This contrasts to a standard of two years before. In addition to the reform of the NIP several other recent or ongoing major reforms impact migrant integration. Along with the NIP reform, language training has also undergone significant changes, moving away from participation to a focus on outcomes, with a personalised language level goal. A new voucher scheme was implemented in 2021 which allows immigrants without free access to training and low language levels to purchase Norwegian classes.

Further changes include the regional reform, which reduced the number of counties while also giving the counties new responsibilities regarding settlement and the integration of immigrants. A further ongoing key initiative concerns the Skills Reform, which includes measures to help more immigrants get access to formal education and vocational training. Finally, changes to the Nationality Act have increased the necessary language knowledge for obtaining Norwegian citizenship while facilitating dual citizenship.

In spite of recent improvements, there are some shortcomings, notably regarding NIP eligibility….

The reforms responded to several shortcomings in the system and generally go in the right direction. For example, prior to the reform, there was little link between education levels of participants and programme duration, and the flexibilisation in programme duration with a stronger focus on upskilling is also welcome.

That notwithstanding, several issues remain in the integration structure which merit attention. One of these is the fact that eligibility to the NIP is restricted to refugees and certain family migrants. The latter are only entitled to participate in the programme if they join a refugee partner with less than five years of residence in the country. Other family migrants do not have a right nor obligation to participate in the Introduction Programme, although municipalities may offer participation nevertheless. Among recent family migrants joining a former refugee, currently only about one in three has the right and obligation to attend the Introduction Programme. Most of those excluded are women.

…and support for higher-skilled migrants

A further key issue that remains largely unaddressed is the high overqualification of immigrants, i.e. tertiary-educated immigrants working in lower-skilled jobs. This is an issue for all migrant groups but especially for refugees, among whom one in two employed tertiary-educated immigrants works in a job below his/her qualification level. At the same time, compared with their native peers, higher incidences of overqualification are not observed for immigrants with domestic qualifications, suggesting that much could be gained by ensuring that immigrants are equipped with Norwegian degrees.

With the new integration framework, individuals who already possess an upper secondary education at the start of the Introduction Programme experience a strong reduction in NIP duration, from previously two years to six months or less. The impact of this drastic cut on labour market outcomes – including job quality – should be carefully monitored. At the same time, to obtain a higher Norwegian degree, immigrants not only need advanced Norwegian skills but also proven English skills – which are not at all part of the Introduction Programme.

Priority should be on ensuring that refugees with higher education and skills in demand get to put their skills to use, including through better bridging to Norwegian degrees. Bridging courses are currently limited, and their broader use should be considered along with support in both English and higher vocational Norwegian. A dedicated programme for refugees with upper secondary education and skills in demand exists as an element of the NIP (Hurtigsporet). Yet, the programme is rarely used and difficulties in identifying potential candidates have been reported, questioning its value added given the new shortened duration of NIP for participants with higher education.

The system of the recognition of qualifications is well-developed, but information sharing on refugees’ skills could be improved

Norway has a well-developed system for qualification recognition and assessment. This is fast and free of charge. In 2020, it took Norway’s responsible agency to assess foreign credentials (NOKUT) on average only 8 working days to finalise an application for higher education assessment, provided all documents were submitted. This is a strong speedup of the process compared to previous years (it was 63 days in 2016), despite overall similar levels in terms of applications and decisions. However, there are no data on the impact that such recognition might have on labour market outcomes and NOKUT currently has no mandate to collect data on non-EU immigrants. These information gaps should be closed.

While recognition is well developed, this is less the case for skills assessment as large. A notable exception concerns refugees, who obtain an initial skills mapping while in reception facilities. However, the information is often not shared among the different stakeholders involved in the process. Improving the information flow regarding migrants’ skills between the integration agency (IMDi), reception centres and municipalities (via counties) ahead of settlement would facilitate planning and also allow for a better assessment of upskilling needs.

The needs of EU migrants merit more consideration

While overall employment rates of EU migrants are high – both in comparison with non-EU immigrants and in international comparison, their skills are often not well used in the labour market. More than one in three employed high-educated EU-migrants work in lower-skilled jobs, three times the level of the native‑born. In contrast to non-EU migrants, who benefit from the NIP and related measures, EU migrants are also underrepresented among those receiving work-related training. What is more, language levels of EU migrants seem to be low, while evidence suggests that labour market rewards for reaching higher levels are substantial for this group. Yet, in contrast to most peer systems, Norway only recently introduced language offers for EU migrants, and their scale and scope is still somewhat limited.

Given these challenges, there should thus be a broader consideration of the needs of EU migrants in language and other upskilling efforts. To this end, a (voluntary) short-term introduction module for EU migrants could be explored, including skills mapping, basic language training and social orientation, as is for example done in Luxembourg.

Norway has impressive data and research infrastructure – but key evaluation issues remain unaddressed

Driven by a comprehensive data infrastructure and public support, research on integration in Norway is highly developed. It is one of the key motors of the country’s constant and impressive drive for innovation and programme improvement. At the same time, there are some surprising gaps. In particular, in spite the significant investment notably into the NIP – the operating expenditure per participant and year amounts to around 18 000 Euros – there has not been a comprehensive effort to assess whether the benefits outweigh the costs. Indeed, many parallel changes make an assessment of programme effectiveness difficult. Assessment of the NIP is particularly challenging due to the entitlement structure and the fact that little is known about what happens at the municipal level, notably with respect to the participation of groups who are not entitled to participation but may be offered a place in the NIP by municipalities. A better registration of NIP participation and content at municipal level would be an important first step in assessing programme effectiveness. It would also allow for a better identification and subsequent mainstreaming of effective practices. To this end, monitoring of NIP outcomes should also be extended in both duration – to cover longer-term outcomes – and scope, notably with respect to job quality which is currently not assessed.

Settlement of humanitarian migrants needs to strike a balance between available offers and the long-term needs of communities and migrants

Currently, Norway’s immigrants are relatively well distributed across the country. This is due to the settlement policy which places immigrants all over Norway, including in more remote areas which are often keen to host immigrants to counter demographic decline. Given the objective of providing everyone without upper secondary education with this qualification level during the Introduction Programme, going forward, newly arrived humanitarian migrants are envisioned to settle only in communities that offer a secondary schooling option. While it is key for migrants to have access to such education, the requirement also cuts off many small and remote communities without a secondary school from the reception of new arrivals. What is more, immigrants’ location preferences are rarely taken into account in the settlement process. A more systematic approach to this should be considered.

Financial incentives could be strengthened

A key goal of the reformed Introduction Programme is to establish a tailored programme for every participant, but integration grants to municipalities have not been adapted to reflect this and are still largely lump-sum based. To accompany and strengthen the individualisation of the NIP, its funding structure should be re‑considered to be more reflective of differing costs and benefits for the integration of migrants with different skills and characteristics, while strengthening municipalities’ incentivises to provide cost-effective integration support.

A stronger follow-up after the NIP would smoothen the transition to sustainable employment

Since 2021, counties – the intermediate level of governance in Norway – are responsible to organise career guidance in career centres as a mandatory element in the NIP to support establishing an individualised integration plan. However, these efforts are currently not followed up upon despite them serving as a promising tool for not only initial reflection but also regular follow-up at the county level to ensure progress is made, increase oversight, and to adjust plans if necessary. Career centres and the county more generally can also support the transition after the Introduction Programme, ideally to employment or education, but otherwise also to ensure former participants are aware of offers in the general system provided by the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV).

Such a transition and regular follow-up is particularly important for immigrant women, who often fall into inactivity after the end of the Introduction Programme.

The decentralised integration system and increased number of stakeholders requires national oversight and efficient co‑ordination

Municipalities are key players in implementing integration policy in Norway. They organise and offer the Introduction Programme, courses in Norwegian and Social Studies and housing for newly arrived immigrants. They are also responsible for co‑ordinating activities provided by other involved actors, such as the county and the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV). The municipalities are obliged to provide the Introduction Programme in full-time but are free to decide the type and design of offers provided. This has resulted in major disparities in the organisation and content of the programme, which further increased in recent years, making both monitoring and nationwide comparisons difficult.

Co‑ordination challenges are further exacerbated by the numerous actors and governmental levels that are involved in the development and execution of integration policy. Since the beginning of 2021, county governments have taken over responsibilities for skills mapping and providing language training for those in full-time upper secondary education, as well as co‑ordination responsibilities at the county-level. They are thus an additional actor in an already quite fragmented and complex tissue of integration service providers. Furthermore, responsibilities at the national level change often and integration policy has been under the auspices of five different ministries in a little over a decade.

Against this backdrop, a strengthened national oversight and co‑ordination should not only help in ensuring similar standards across the country but facilitate identification and exchange of good practices across municipalities, including with a view of upscaling and mainstreaming successful initiatives.

The qualification programme provides effective support for vulnerable migrants, but access could be improved

To integrate the long-term unemployed into the labour market, Norway runs a national Qualification Programme. It includes work-oriented activities, education and training as well as close individual follow-up and guidance. Immigrants account for about 6 in 10 programme participants and indeed, the programme seems to be more effective for immigrants than for their native‑born peers.

That notwithstanding, a recent investigation by Norway’s auditor however finds that many immigrants who have a right to participate in the KVP are not offered a possibility to participate. However, the report also stresses that this differs greatly by the municipality as overall many NAV offices and municipalities assess similar cases differently and that regulations offer a lot of room for individual interpretation.

There is an innovative programme for immigrant women, but coverage could be strengthened…

Immigrant women outside the labour force are specifically targeted through an employment qualification programme (Jobbsjansen) designed to reintegrate stay-at-home immigrant women. It combines language training, career guidance, work placed training and regular follow-up measures. The scheme appears to achieve better results than the NIP in getting women into work or education although a full assessment is difficult, given the selection issues involved and non-negligible dropout numbers.

Since 2016, around 900 participants have taken part in the programme annually, which is offered in around 40 municipalities. Increased funding would allow more women to participate as well as expand the geographical reach of projects.

…and the same goes for mentorship, which is currently underdeveloped

Many vacancies in Norway are not advertised publicly. Norway’s Employment Agency estimates that about one in four employers fills their positions through their networks or internal recruitment. This puts not only immigrants but also their native‑born offspring at a disadvantage, as they have fewer relevant networks. One way to overcome this is through mentorship programmes. Norway has several local examples of mentorship programmes supported through public funding. However, no large scale or nationwide programmes exist. Given the limited cost and high effectiveness of such a programme, an upscaling would be welcome.

Discrimination in the labour market is a problem but has received strong attention in recent years

One persistent structural impediment to integration, in Norway as elsewhere, is discrimination. Incidences of self-reported discrimination are relatively high in international comparison, notably for native‑born youth with migrant parents. While this seems at least in part to be due to a high awareness of the issue, its pertinence has also been underlined by testing studies in Norway, notably regarding employment and the housing market. Combatting discrimination is a key policy priority for Norway and public awareness of discrimination is high. Norway has comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation in place encouraging public and private employers to diversify their workforce. Since 2020, all enterprises with more than 50 employees are obliged to have active, targeted, and systematic efforts to combat discrimination. This includes an obligation to report on their efforts. Companies may also receive support from Norway’s Equality and Anti-Discrimination Ombud, who is working to establish agreements with large national firms to provide guidance on this obligation.

The public sector functions as a role model for integration

OECD-wide, Norway is among the few countries that have achieved an equal employment rate in public sector jobs among native‑born youth, irrespective of parental origin. This is, at least in part, the result of longstanding and strong policies to foster equal opportunities in this sector. For public sector jobs, employers in Norway must invite at least one applicant with migrant parents for an interview, and in case of equally qualified candidates offer the job to those with migrant parents first. There is also a pilot in place to test anonymous CVs in the public sector.

Overall educational outcomes of offspring of immigrants are not unfavourable, but important gaps remain

The ultimate measure for the long-term success of integration policy are the outcomes of the children of immigrants who have been raised and educated in Norway. This group is both substantial and rapidly growing. In 2021, over one in three children in Norway (34%) under the age of 15 had at least one foreign-born parent, about twice the figure observed 15 years earlier.

Their outcomes show a differentiated picture. While data on educational outcomes at age 15 show a gap of the equivalent of one school year (and thus well above the OECD average), many still seem to manage to acquire good formal educations. In 2018, almost every second 25‑ to 34‑years-olds native‑born with parents born abroad had completed tertiary education, a high share in international comparison. There are high gender gaps in outcomes, with immigrant boys faring much worse than girls.

Children of immigrants have benefited from the expansion of early childhood education and care, but Norwegian language screening and support needs to be more systematic

Participation of children of immigrants in early childhood education and care (ECEC) has expanded massively over the past 15 years, and this can be expected to give a boost to educational outcomes at age 15 in the years to come. These efforts need to be accompanied by ensuring that all children in kindergarten have sufficient proficiency in Norwegian before starting primary school. Introducing systematic language assessments earlier in the process is one possible solution going forward. Systematic language support for those children with insufficient skills should complement these assessments, as is already standard practice in many other OECD countries.

Cash-for-care subsidies should be reconsidered, and the money saved invested into free kindergarten offers

Norway provides cash-for-care subsidies for mothers who raise their children at home rather than sending them to ECEC. While access for migrant mothers has been systematically restricted in recent years, immigrant families are still disproportionately obtaining this benefit, which also impacts negatively on employment of migrant mothers. While ECEC is not free in Norway, there are several subsidies and free kindergarten offers for low-income families. These offers have proved especially effective in increasing immigrant children’s ECEC attendance and should be streamlined and complemented with Norway’s ongoing outreach efforts to inform parents about these offers.

The employment rate of immigrant mothers is high, which seems at least in part due to the NIP

Despite the disincentives by the cash-for-care benefit for some migrant groups, with 74% of foreign-born mothers with a child under the age of six in Norway in employment, Norway boasts high rates compared to other OECD countries. While the impact of having small children in terms of employment is greatest for refugee mothers, with motherhood reducing their likelihood of being in employment by over 10 percentage points for this group, these differences are still small in international comparison. This seems at least in part due to the gender equality norms transmitted through the NIP. To ensure that women do not drop out of the programme, municipalities can offer flexible arrangements, easy access to childcare and adapted content and duration.

Many young migrants attend upper secondary education but many fail to complete

One issue in the education system are high drop-out rates from vocational education, notably for boys. One in three foreign-born boys drops out of vocational education, compared to 9% among those in the study preparation track. The current VET model requires two years of school before entering the workplace. A more flexible VET provision with earlier work-based training may be more attractive for academically weak students, who are those with the highest drop-out rates. Introducing work-based learning would further mean that students get professional contacts and are better prepared for apprenticeships and more likely to secure a placement. In 2018, only 62% of the applicants with migrant parents received an apprenticeship contract, while the number was 78% for the other applicants.

An ongoing educational reform aims to address the low completion rates so that students who do not receive an apprenticeship will instead be enrolled in further education for two years. A number of further steps are recommended to reduce the high drop-out, including better guidance of migrant families on the Norwegian education system; combining work-based training from day one in the low vocational education tracks; early support in searching for apprenticeship via mentorships and networking events; and stronger incentives for employers to reach out and provide places for children of immigrants and other disadvantaged groups.

The skills of youth with migrant parents are not well used in the labour market, highlighting a need for comprehensive action

Of particular concern is the fact that youth with migrant parents do not always manage to get their qualifications valued in the labour market. In 2019, overall employment rates of youth with immigrant parents remained, at 73%, remained 10 percentage points below their peers with native‑born parents, and gaps increase with qualification levels. Given the lack of networks and knowledge of labour market functioning along with discrimination, more needs to be done to support labour market entry. Many of the measures outlined just above regarding vocational education would also bear benefits for broader labour market integration – regardless of the chosen educational track and the level obtained.

Norway has a highly-developed integration system, and addressing the remaining bottlenecks would further enhance its effectiveness

Norway has clearly one of the most highly developed integration systems in the OECD. The considerable investment is needed to equip vulnerable migrants to integrate into one of the most skilled labour markets and societies of the OECD, with strong gender equality. One of the hallmarks of the Norwegian approach to integration is its constant drive for improvement, as witnessed by a large number of new initiatives and action plans, many of which go into the right direction but lack follow-up and upscaling. While a full assessment of programme effectiveness is currently not possible, the relatively good outcomes notably for migrant mothers and their children suggest that the significant effort that is put into migrant integration bears some fruit. That notwithstanding, more could be done to identify and mainstream successful initiatives, and to make sure that all groups are adequately covered and reached by existing offers, notably through stronger co‑ordination and monitoring. To this end, the following actions are recommended:

List of recommendations

Enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of the Introduction Programme

• Incentivise the development and effectiveness of tailored integration plans by replacing the current financial generic per capita transfers to municipalities with a more refined payment schedule, rewarding municipalities which undertake specific efforts in this respect. The altered financial scheme should also account for participants’ characteristics and as a result, the likely estimated scale and scope of required integration support. On that basis, the scheme should include a premium for successful and sustainable integration, measured by the longer-term outcomes of participants.

• Ensure that skills mapping is done using a common framework. Improve the information flow regarding migrants’ skills between IMDi, reception centres and municipalities (via counties) ahead of settlement.

• Ensure similar standards in the delivery of the Introduction Programme across the country, building on recent efforts to provide standardised course elements, with clearly defined measurement and follow-up.

• Collect information on settlement and employment preferences of refugees as part of the initial skills mapping, and consider this information in the placement decision.

• Monitor the impact of the current practice of limiting the settlement of refugees to municipalities with upper secondary schools with respect to refugees’ distribution and settlement patterns. Allow for adjustments that adapt to labour market needs and population concerns of smaller and rural municipalities.

• Support inter-municipal co‑operation in the NIP, to allow NIP participants in one municipality to complete parts of their programme, in a different municipality.

• Monitor the impact of the drastically shortened NIP time for those with upper secondary education since 2021 (3‑12 months compared to 2 years before) and make sure that the programme allows for adequate skills development to qualify to employment and education and provide more flexibility where needed.

• Make vocation-specific bridging offers widely available and pilot profession-specific paths in the fast-track programme.

• Mainstream current efforts to include participants’ feedback and suggestions in the further development and adaptation of the NIP.

• Consider an adapted Introduction Programme for parents with children below the age of 3 and investigate the intensity of the Introduction Programme for these migrants.

• Continue current efforts to use comprehensive indicators to assess long-term outcomes of the Introduction Programme and act on the results.

Smoothen the transition from the Introduction Programme

• Assess the reasons behind the high and increasing share of women who participated in the Introduction Programme and whose labour market status shortly thereafter becomes unknown.

  • Establish a systematic follow-up mechanism via a specialised caseworker when the NIP ends to ensure that women, in particular low-skilled mothers, are aware of and can access labour market support measures after the NIP.

• For higher-educated participants in the NIP, make sure that they can obtain/validate English language skills necessary for admission to higher education.

• Provide higher-skilled refugees and their family members with a trained mentor or dedicated caseworker to smoothen the transition to a job and education that puts their skills and education to use.

Make sure all immigrants in need can easily access integration offers

• Offer all immigrants who join a refugee partner access to the NIP, irrespective of their partners’ length of residence in the country.

• Make sure that all permanent immigrants are offered Norwegian language training by extending the right to language training to all family immigrants from non-EU countries and promoting the new language offers for EU migrants.

• Enhance the use of vocational language training and certification of corresponding skills, accounting for both migrants’ skills and labour market needs.

• Make sure that migrants benefit from available training offers, including by raising awareness among migrants and employers.

• Pilot a (voluntary) short-term introduction module for EU migrants, including skills mapping, basic language training and social orientation.

Ensure long-term labour market attachment

• Strengthen the role of career guidance throughout the integration process.

  • For NIP participants, ensure regular follow-up (after the initial one‑time career guidance at the start of the NIP.

  • For immigrant groups with no right to the NIP, make the possibility of career guidance more widely known and enhance access via translators, group-specific and online offers.

• Enhance the use of the “real competence assessment” and similar tools to certify informal skills in skills assessment and qualification plans, in co‑operation with the social partners.

• Scale‑up and expand the geographical reach of the existing second chance programme for stay-at-home immigrant women.

• Enhance access to and participation in the qualification programme as well as of bridging offers for migrant in need of qualification and skills adaptation to Norwegian standards.

• Monitor the impact of access restrictions to social assistance on quality of employment and long-term outcomes.

• Strengthen civil society engagement by simplifying available support measures for civil society initiatives.

Strengthen efforts to integrate children of immigrants

• Abolish the cash-for-care benefits and use the money saved to further extend and promote free ECEC for low-income households, with a specific focus on immigrant families.

• Raise awareness about existing fee reductions for ECEC and the benefits of participation for children of immigrants.

• Provide for a systematic language screening well before the start of primary education, and provide targeted language support for those assessed to lag behind.

• Provide clear national guidance for conducting language proficiency assessments in the education system. Establish national minimum standards and regular evaluation to incentivise the provision of quality language support.

• Address the high drop-out of children of immigrants from upper secondary education, including through

  • better guidance of migrant families on the Norwegian education system;

  • combining work-based training from day one in the low vocational education tracks;

  • early support in searching for apprenticeship via mentorships and networking events;

  • systematic provision of contacts between youth with immigrant parents and employers during the first year of upper secondary education;

  • incentives for employers to reach out and provide places for disfavoured youth.

Tackle discrimination and enhance diversity

• Make anti-discrimination instruments better known among all migrants and inform them about their rights.

• Ensure employers are aware of the language skills they demand from immigrant candidates, and possible differentiation between competence fields (e.g. oral vs written).

• Include apprenticeship providers under the regulations encouraging employers to diversify their workforce.

Improve co‑ordination

• Make sure that the increasing decentralisation and enhanced number of stakeholders in the integration process are met with a stronger co‑ordination responsibility at the national level.

• Promote identification and exchange of good practices across municipalities, including with a view of upscaling and mainstreaming successful initiatives.

• Engage in regular consultation and dialogue with immigrant associations by formalising the communication channels that emerged during COVID‑19 and enhanced communication during the implementation of the new Integration Act.

• Ensure that frequent changes in responsibilities do not result in under- or overprovision of integration services. Systematically track and exchange information between the stakeholders on integration activities undertaken throughout the integration process.

Improve monitoring of outcomes

• Improve monitoring of the uptake and outcomes of language training at the individual level.

• Provide for a more systematic assessment of the effectiveness of new programmes and Action plans, and act on the results.

• Ensure that immigrants in primary education after the NIP are coded as “in education” and do not fall into a generic missing category.

• Include broader measures, such as longer-term employment, job quality, and language outcomes, in the assessment of the Introduction Programme.

• Assess the impact of eligibility cut-off-points regarding age and duration of residence (for the access of family migrants who join a refugee) in the NIP on outcomes.

• Monitor the uptake of municipal NIP participation for groups who are not entitled to participation, and build on this monitoring to assess NIP effectiveness.

• Improve data collection on the usage of skills assessment and recognition services and investigate the labour market impact of these services for finding adequate employment. Provide NOKUT with the mandate to collect data on non-EU immigrants.