Improved Institutional Capacities and New Multilevel Governance for Talent Attraction and Retention in the Danube Region

Project acronym: TalentMagnet
Project title: Improved Institutional Capacities and New Multilevel Governance for
Talent Attraction and Retention in the Danube Region
Programme: Interreg Danube
Duration: 07/2020 – 12/2022
Partner countries: Slovenia, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Croatia, Germany, Czech
Republic, Austria, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, Ukraine

18 fortunate cities in the Danube Region will develop innovative tools to attract and retain talented young workforce with the creation of useful, concrete guides, plans and tools. Thanks to a new EU co-financed project, talented young workforce may not go to work in the capital or big cities or abroad, instead they will stay in the local area thus contributing to the local economy.

Small and medium-sized cities in the Danube region such as Nyíregyháza (HU), Apatin (Serbia), Velenje (SLO) etc. lose highly-educated young people – they move to the capital or abroad to study and they do not return. According to OECD-UNDESA “World migration in Figures”, the biggest increase in emigration rates were recorded in Danube area, having demographic and labour market implications. It leads to shortage of highly educated workforce in businesses/institutions, reducing their competitiveness and innovation capacity. The employers then cannot create high quality jobs, attractive work environment, career opportunities, further driving away talent. The process has dramatic consequences. However, quality job supply is only one factor in talent retention/attraction. Local authorities can counteract brain-drain by improving conditions for talented people, if crucial key factors are better understood (affordable housing, quality public services, good education, attractive cultural life/recreational facilities), designed and delivered as integrated actions.

A new EU co-financed project, TalentMagnet addresses major societal (demographic and labour market) challenges caused by the outmigration of highly-educated young people, primarily from small- and medium sized towns in the Danube Region (brain drain).

18 cities from the Danube Region will develop models, tools and plans that are helpful for talent attraction and retention building on transnational experience and knowledge.

During the implementation, the participating cities will involve sectors such as academia, business, administration and civil society further contributes to better the local economic and social environment of cities to become more appealing for young talents. To reach our goal, several appealing tools (e.g. a smart phone application) will be developed which are addressing young talents and using their language. Furthermore, several models, guides and tools will be developed and also tested in the partner cities.

The European Foundation for Education will represent Baden-Württemberg in the international consortium as knowledge provider contributing to the creation of the framework of the project, capitalizing on the results from previous EU projects such es EDU-LAB.

TalentMagnet project is co-funded by the European Union Funds (ERDF, IPA, ENI).

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