The more educated, the farther from Azerbaijan

The father is worried about this - how to let the son stay alone in a strange city, where the attitude to non-Slavic national labor migrants is negative? On the other hand, what to do if for a year and a half a graduate on the ITC could not find a job on the profile. He was offered a job of security guard in the store, in restaurants, the operator at gas stations; and staff cut is expected in state structures.

After discussing the situation, the family grinding heart, agreed with the decision of their son. By the way, many of the guy's friends work far from their homeland.

"Now in Azerbaijan the employers prefer to give job to specialists with foreign diplomas. But the trouble is that they, too, are not accepted without a bribe and a "top" call. Murad, my son"s friend, graduated from the University in the United States as a manager. So what? For two years, he looked for a job in Baku, sent CV to dozens of companies, starting from SOCAR, ending with a travel agency; and finally he had to return to New York, where he now sells mobile phones. Another young man returned to Germany, where he studied law, and now works as a taxi driver," said a former colleague.

Recently, Salim Muslimov, the Minister of Labor and Social Protection of the Population cited an interesting fact: out of 4.6 million able-bodied population of Azerbaijan only 32% have higher or secondary special education. Hence, approximately only about 20% are economically active citizens with higher education. Every second secondary school graduate does not consider it necessary to continue studying, to get a specialty and a profession.

For comparison: according to Eurostat, in Latvia the people with higher education in 2016 was slightly less than half of the able-bodied population of the country - almost 43% (more than 56% of then are women), in Estonia and Lithuania - 45% and 58% respectively. The percentage of graduated in Germany, Norway, Finland is even higher.

Of course, comparison with European neighbors is not the benefit of Azerbaijan. There is a reasonable question - why, with more than 40 public and private universities, our country does not reach the Baltic indicators in terms of the number of people with higher education? Are not Universities available? Where do graduates of higher schools go?

For more than ten recent years, about 120 thousand people with higher education left the country, said in an interview with "Turan" independent expert-economist, Azer Mehdiyev, who conducted a study on this topic. According to migration data, for the indicated period, every eighth resident with a higher or secondary technical education left our republic at the working age of 18 to 65 years. At the age category from 25 to 34 years every third specialist who graduated from the university left the country.

Another thing is surprising: according to the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection, the national economy needs 8.000 graduates of universities - engineers, veterinarians, designers, technologists, IT specialists. In a few years, this figure will grow by many times.

There are two basic reasons for the outflow of graduates. First, the economy is not sufficiently developed, it does not keep up with the pace of graduation by higher education institutions. There is practically no textile, shoe industry in the country, and the fish processing industry is poorly developed. The agrarian and tourist spheres have been developing for the last couple of years. The second and decisive factor is a salary. The most active part of the population leaves the country in search of a decent wage - able-bodied men aged 25 to 34 years. The second place is occupied by the age group from 35 to 49 years.

"However, this important point attracts attention. Mainly the representatives of the professions in which the state invests funds and which allegedly are in demand leave the country: mainly engineers, IT specialists, doctors, builders. According to surveys, more than 50% of emigrants with higher education named the economic reasons for their departure. In terms of wages Azerbaijan ranks the last in South Caucasus, not to mention Europe (a little more than $300.) True, this year the minimum salary rose from 116 manat to 130 manat, slightly increased the salaries of teachers. Nothing is said about doctors. Is it a decent salary for a qualified specialist? "Mehdiyev asks.

The chairman of the Center for Sustainable Development Studies, Nariman Agayev, agrees with this position. In his opinion, the main reason why young specialists with foreign or domestic diploma leave the country is a low level of wages. It is important not only to train the staff, but also to provide them with decent wage.

There is a demand for hundreds of specialists in exact and natural sciences in Azerbaijan, because of higher salaries they leave to work abroad.

"Young people do not believe the government, which does little to improve life in the country. On paper (for the UN report) everything is fine, there is a dynamic of development, but in fact the number of poor people is increasing. Therefore, many young Azerbaijanis leave for the West on scholarship programs, grants on a working or guest visas, and remain there. They do not see a perspective on their homeland,"Agayev said.