The Minister of Labor Yannis Panagiotou stated on Tuesday that the access of foreign students to the labor market is expanding, noting at the same time that the attraction and utilization of students from third countries who wish to study and work, is an important parameter of the government's development planning.
The Minister said that expanded access can combine university education with professional development, help upgrade services provided, staff some of the seasonal needs and create additional quality higher education jobs that are attractive to domestic human resources. potential.
Speaking after the meeting of the Council of Ministers, the Minister said that the further exploitation in the labor market formed by the Ministries of Finance, Interior, Education and Labour, includes the strengthening of the supervisory framework, the updating of the access provided, the expansion of accessible occupations, the extension of the permitted working hours and the provision of the possibility to stay for work after the completion of the undergraduate studies.
He said that the Ministries of Labor and Education "have planned increased inspections to check the student status of working foreign students to check that they are actively participating in their academic programs of study while at the same time promoting the tightening of penalties for them and the institutions they attend so that exemplary cases of abuses and violations are dealt with".
Mr. Panagiotou also said that it has been decided to renew the decree on the access of foreign students to the labor market, which is issued by his Ministry and students were entitled to work until March 2024, as well as to expand the professions in which they are allowed access including retail salespeople, following labor market checks for local availability.
He added that the Home Office is working on amending the legislative framework to increase the maximum number of working hours per week during study periods from 20 to 25 and to provide the possibility to stay in the country for work for 12 months after completing undergraduate studies.
The Minister of Labor emphasized that it is expected that "the rational utilization of the expanded access to the market of third-country nationals will have a positive effect on the development prospects of Cyprus through the legal and transparent staffing of businesses and organizations and the further expansion of Cypriot higher education".
In response to a question, he said that the numbers indicative of foreigners working are about 1.500, and student nationals of third countries amount to about 5.000.
In another question, he said that in order to be able to respond to the staffing needs of the market, we implement an integrated policy with various parameters and the priority is the full utilization of domestic staff, workers from EU member states.
"It is known that there is a procedure through the Ministry of Labor for the issuance of work permits and the provision of additional access possibilities for foreigners to the labor market, we believe that it will have a positive effect because these are people who are already in Cyprus, who have acclimatized to the Cypriot culture, many can communicate in the Greek language, they have already been evaluated by our universities to move here for studies, so we consider that in a way that does not deprive the locals of opportunities to access the labor market, their further utilization will be very useful and essential ", he said.
Source: KYPE
