International Organization for Migration (IOM)

Improving Access to Labour market Information for migrants and employers
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uncertainty implied by the quota system, and so on (see Section 1) – severely hampers
the incentives of potential employers to recruit workers directly from abroad. To the
best of our knowledge, no one has ever tried to quantify how many of the ‘new
entries’ permitted with the ‘Flows Decree’ are truly ‘new entries’ in the Italian labour
market. What is clear is that the vast majority are not. Still, there may be a few
exceptions: first, some very highly skilled workers, who were recruited through a
formal screening; second, workers who were hired by an entrepreneur or family
thanks to a referral of one of his/her current employees; third, co-nationals hired by
immigrant entrepreneurs, who possibly knew them from before moving to Italy or
met (and screened) them during a holiday in the origin country.
The reality may be different for citizens of NMS of EU27 who, after the abolishment
of the transitional provisions, can now freely access the Italian labour market. In
their case, one could expect firms to be interested in recruiting them directly from
abroad (mainly because they can be hired outside the quota system). Still, given
that these workers enjoy free mobility, it may be more efficient for them to move
to Italy in order to look for a job (as they probably know that informal channels of
recruiting are paramount there). But then, we would be back to the recruiting of
resident immigrants, which has been discussed in the previous sections.
In July 2009, the Italian government launched FLEXI, an online platform which is
conceived to ease the match between Italian employers and workers residing abroad. 55
According to the information currently provided on the website, the platform is still
in an experimental phase and it hosts about 540 candidate profiles. Moreover, after
some screening and training activities carried out in Tunisia, 84 (sic) candidates
have been classified as suitable for being hired in Italy. 56 Although this initiative
is potentially promising, these numbers seem far from adequate for a large labour
market such as the Italian one.
4. Conclusions and recommendations
Among experts and commentators of the Italian migration policy there is a fairly
widespread consensus that Italian governments have so far missed the opportunity
to play a major role in shaping and leading the labour market integration of foreign
workers. On the contrary, throughout the last three decades, one can continually
observe an important “gap between market realities and immigration policies”
(Ambrosini, 2011b) and recognize how government intervention and legislation
have adjusted to, rather than determined, the informal evolution of the migrant
presence in the Italian economy and society. 57 The lack of adequate possibilities
55 See: http://www.lavoro.gov.it/Lavoro/Notizie/20090714_FLEXI_Online.htm. The database can be
accessed at the following link: https://www.flexi.lavoro.gov.it/flexi.
56 See: http://www.cliclavoro.gov.it.
57 “The transition [from being an emigration to being an immigration country] came about in a way that
was largely spontaneous, unexpected, and loosely regulated: it arose “ from below” in the labour market and in
local societies, and was acknowledged only later – reluctantly – by public institutions and legal regulations”
(Ambrosini, 2011b).