BERLIN, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- German enrolment in further education, life-long learning and other forms of continued training courses has fallen in the past years, according to a study published on Tuesday by the Bertelsmann Foundation.
According to the Bertelsmann Foundation's 2018 "further education atlas", the share of German inhabitants aged 25 or above who took part in such professional training declined from 12.6 percent in 2012 to 12.2 percent in 2015.
Although the figures only marked a slight decline, the downward trend is still surprising in light of ongoing and far-reaching changes in the domestic labor market caused by digitalization.
Experts, employer- and employee representatives in Germany have repeatedly emphasized that digital technologies will increase the importance of further education to ensure that workers acquire new skills rather than simply being replaced by automation and artificial intelligence (AI).
The Confederation of German Trade Unions (DGB) recently made a dramatic public appeal to the German government to ramp up related investment in response to an estimate by the World Economic Forum (WEF) that only 46 percent of German employees are currently prepared for the digital workplace.
Positions which were hereby seen to be in particularly high demand during the so-called "fourth industrial revolution" included those of data analysts, software engineers, as well as e-Commerce and social-media specialists.
Aside from getting more Germans to enroll in corresponding professional courses, however, the Bertelsmann Foundation noted on Tuesday that policymakers faced a further challenge in this context in the shape of large regional differences in the size of trainee intakes.
Whereas 15.3 percent of inhabitants of the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg completed some form of life-long learning last year, the ratio was only measured at 10.5 percent in the city states of Berlin and Bremen and 7.8 percent in lowest-ranked Saarland.
For Joerg Draeger, the president of the Guetersloh-based foundation, the findings were a "wake-up call" for the government.
"Too often the place of residence and the strength of the local economy determine whether somebody enrolls in further education. It is precisely in economically weaker regions that people need continued training to enhance their chances of obtaining a good job," a statement by Draeger read.
The "further education atlas" also showed that workers with relatively low qualifications were least likely to enlist in re-training.
Only 5.6 percent of individuals aged between 25 and 54 in that specific cohort took part in courses although they theoretically stood to benefit the most.
"In order for poor and low-qualified individuals to participate in further education more often, they must receive more guidance and financial support," the Bertelsmann Foundation president demanded.
