200,000 job openings for nurses in Germany not only for Filipinos, POEA clarifies

MANILA - Do you want to work as a nurse in Germany? Well, the application process is not that easy, a recruitment and migration expert said.

Speaking to radio dzMM Thursday, recruitment and migration expert Emmanuel Geslani said the Philippines won't be able to fill in the 200,000 job openings for nurses in Germany.

"No. If you're looking at 2020, that is only four years from now. Personally, as a recruitment consultant in the business for 35 years, we do not foresee this number to be growing, not even by the number of 10,000 by that time," he said.

The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) recently announced that Germany is in need of 200,000 nurses until the year 2020, expressing preference to hire Filipinos.

The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) Governing Board, meantime, decided to expand the Triple Win Project between the governments of the Philippines and Germany to include the participation of private recruitment agencies.

DOLE Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz also said that the country can tap the World Health Organization and International Labor Organization's joint Human Resource Development Technical Cooperation Program for possible specialized training on geriatric care, noting that the Philippines does not have this due to the absence of nursing homes here.

READ: Higit 400,000 trabaho sa Germany at Qatar, pwede para sa mga Pinoy

Geslani, however, stressed that not only do Filipino nurses lack training on geriatric care, they also lack actual clinical care in general.

This lack of exposure to clinical care will be a major problem for registered nurses who want to apply for work in Germany, he said. Most countries, like the United States and those in the Middle East, require a minimum of two years of clinical experience.

"Eh dahil nga sa kakulangan ng ating mga ospital at mahirap talagang pumasok... we are not producing enough experienced nurses to fulfill the demands of many other countries asking for Filipino nurses," Geslani said. "We don't have enough nurses who can comply with the requirements."

LANGUAGE PROBLEM

Another problem is the difficulty of learning German language, which is also a key requirement for jobseekers there.

"If we go by the number of deployed nurses to Germany since two years ago, ang nade-deploy pa lang natin is less than 300...because of the difficulty in learning and speaking and writing yung German language," he said.

Of the 222 Filipino nurses accepted by Germany, only 128 have been deployed so far, as the rest are still completing their preparatory German language training in the Philippines.

According to Elsa Villa, president of the Philippine Association of Service Exporters Inc. (PASEI), German language training takes about six months and costs around P60,000.

"And you cannot just take it in any particular school na merong language training -- because I'm sure magmu-mushroom yan ngayon because of this -- it has to be accredited by the government of Germany. Yun ho ang medyo madugo diyan," she said.

EMPLOYER'S COST

But POEA Administrator Hans Leo Cacdac, in a separate interview on dzMM, clarified that the expenses for the language proficiency requirement should be shouldered by the employer. If one decides to go ahead with the training with no employer yet, he or she should later ask the employer to reimburse the cost of the training.

Cacdac also clarified that the 200,000 job openings for nurses in Germany are not for Filipinos only. There are also no job orders yet, he said.

"Hindi naman ibig sabihin 200,000 Filipino nurses... Ibig sabihin lang yun yung projected nila," he explained.

He said Philippine-licensed recruitment agencies are still in the process of bringing in German employers. Accreditation for German employers will take two to three months.

Recruitment will commence after that, followed by the required six-month language training. "So, hindi ito agad-agaran na bukas makalawa makakaalis na," Cacdac said.

The 200,000 job openings in Qatar are likewise not only for Filipinos. Qatar is in need of construction and service workers ahead of the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

Meanwhile, Cacdac warned jobseekers against illegal recruitment agencies and dubious job orders.

"Ang payo ko sa mga jobseekers natin is i-check kung licensed ang agency. Tapos di na lang dapat whether lisensyado yung recruitment agency kundi pati yung job offer at employer na inaalok nito," he said.