Non-EU workers up by 8.5% to 68,000 in first half of 2023

Malta experienced an 8.5% growth in non-EU nationals over the course of seven months in 2023. 

Data published in the House of Representatives in response to a PQ from Nationalist MP Graziella Galea, shows that Malta’s number of registered foreign workers from outside the EU grew from 63,400 in January 2023, to 68,755 in July 2023. 

The growth in numbers coincides with a growing political discourse about the effect of foreign workers on employment remuneration, property prices and public infrastructure use. 

The largest cohort of foreign workers in the data are Indians, numbering over 13,000, and growing by 13.5% from January to July 2023. 

They are followed by Filipinos (9,500), Nepalese (8,100), Britons (5,100), Serbians, Albanians, Colombians, Turks, Pakistanis, and Macedonians. The largest increase was that of Colombians, growing by 25.5% to 3,149 in July 2023. 

EU workers on the other hand grew from 33,470 to 34,900 over the same period (4.3%). 

The data shows that there were 34,900 and 1,912 dependents from the EU in July 2023, apart from 412 workers hailing from EFTA nations Iceland, Norway and Switzerland. 

The largest EU population in Malta are Italians, numbering 11,500, growing by 4.3% over the same period. They are followed by Romanians (2,600), Bulgarians, Spaniards, French, Germans, Hungarians, Poles, and Swedes. 

A quarter of Maltese businesses employ workers from outside the EU, a recent Eurobarometer survey on skills shortages and recruitment in small and medium-sized enterprises shows. The findings place Maltese companies as the third most likely in the EU to hire non-EU workers. 

44% of the surveyed 252 Maltese businesses believed that simplifying procedures for hiring non-EU workers could aid in recruiting staff with the necessary skills. This sentiment was echoed by 38% of SMEs across all EU member states. A majority of respondents, 59%, believed that improved collaboration with public employment services represented the most effective measure to tackle skill shortages. 

Foreign workers from outside the European Union are also twice as likely as Maltese workers to present a termination notice within a year of being employed, according to a Central Bank study. 

36% of third country nationals working in Malta have their job terminated within a year, while 15% have their jobs terminated in just three months. Among Maltese workers, just 10% of all Maltese workers are subject to a termination notice within three months of them being first engaged. But the proportion then drops much more, with less than 20% being terminated in the first year.