Brussels, Belgium / RankWire.AI / – The European Union is currently on course to fall short of its Digital Decade target of employing 20 million information and communications technology specialists by 2030, according to a comprehensive study published by European Union research agency Eurofound. Official reports released by Emirates News Agency confirmed that the EU set to fall short of 2030 ICT target by 5 million workers despite sustained multi-year job expansion across the regional technology landscape. The Eurofound report, titled IT Sector in Focus: Evolution of the EU Digital Workforce, revealed that primary education and vocational education and training systems across most European member states are failing to keep pace with present and projected enterprise demand for specialized digital competencies. Consequently, corporate recruitment across the bloc has become increasingly reliant on skilled labor migration originating from non-EU nations to address acute staffing deficits.
Despite the anticipated shortfall, overall employment figures in Europe’s digital sector have shown significant growth over the past decade. Eurofound’s data indicates that the number of ICT specialists in the EU increased from 5.6 million in 2011 to 10.3 million in 2024, a rise of 81 percent. During the same period, ICT professionals’ share of total European employment grew from 3 percent to 5 percent. Nevertheless, annual sector growth rates of 7 percent to 8 percent remain insufficient to bridge the gap needed to meet the 20 million target set by European policymakers for the end of the decade.
Large regional disparities in digital employment persist across individual EU member states. Eurofound reported that ICT specialists made up 8.6 percent of total employment in Sweden, 8 percent in Luxembourg, and 7.8 percent in Finland during 2024. In contrast, digital specialists accounted for just 2.5 percent of the workforce in Greece and 2.8 percent in Romania. Growth rates also varied considerably, with Estonia more than doubling its share of ICT workers from 3.4 percent to 7.2 percent between 2011 and 2024, while other member states experienced minimal percentage increases over the same period.
Educational Gaps Fuel Dependence on External Talent Acquisition
A survey of enterprises across the bloc highlighted that 57 percent of European companies faced severe recruitment challenges when trying to fill IT roles in 2024. The most acute shortages are within senior engineering and specialized fields such as cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, generative AI, and cloud computing infrastructure. To bridge these critical gaps, technology firms have increasingly looked beyond Europe for talent, resulting in the proportion of ICT specialists born outside the EU rising from 9.2 percent in 2021 to 11.9 percent in 2024.
Ongoing gender disparities continue to limit the potential of Europe’s digital workforce. Eurofound reported that women made up less than one in five ICT specialists across the 27 EU member states in 2024, with a 19 percent share. In addition, gender pay gaps in the broader information and communications sector stood at nearly 20 percent in 2022, surpassing the economy-wide average of 13 percent. Researchers from Eurofound emphasized that the underrepresentation of women results in European industries operating with less than three quarters of their potential digital talent pool, restricting the infusion of diverse perspectives in technological development.
Core Software Sector Growth Highlights Persistent Challenges
The report underlined that while ICT roles generally offer above-average pay, advanced skills, and high-quality employment, these factors alone cannot resolve the structural labor shortages. With the EU projected to fall short of its 2030 ICT employment goal by 5 million, experts stress that closing this gap will require strategic policy measures aimed at boosting domestic education efforts and facilitating mobility within the EU. The study combined quantitative data with insights from the Network of Eurofound Correspondents and professional analytics from LinkedIn Economic Graph.
EU policymakers and industry leaders are under increasing pressure to adapt national vocational frameworks to meet future digital economy needs. Eurofound concluded that failing to address domestic training deficiencies could lead to greater reliance on foreign talent markets, threatening Europe’s broader digital transformation goals. Authorities continue to evaluate workforce development strategies, including expanding local training programs, encouraging female participation in tech disciplines, and maintaining competitiveness across the global technology landscape.