Effects on the European Economy of Shortages of Foreign Language Skills in Enterprise

‘Language skills will be important in achieving European policy goals, particularly against a background of increasing global competition’ (European Commission)

CiLT, the National Centre for Languages is the UK government’s recognised centre of expertise on languages. Its role is to support both language teaching and learning, and the effective use of language skills in business, the public services and cultural life.

A study commissioned by CiLT clearly confirmed that ‘languages enable you to receive better information about the business environment and new ideas about production, raw materials, marketing and trade channels’.

As a result of this study, CiLT strongly recommends to ‘improve the contextualisation of courses and qualifications to the business context’ as well as to ‘diversify the range of languages taught’ – since ‘a significant percentage of small and medium enterprises across the EU and the wider Europe are losing export business through lack of language skills and (...) intercultural skills.’