‘International students worth 1.5 billion a year’
Most international students leave when they graduate, but almost one in four still lives here five years later. After deducting costs, these highly educated people provide the treasury with 1.5 billion euro per year. This is evident from research conducted by internationalisation organisation Nuffic into the so-called stay rate and the jobs of international graduates in the Netherlands.
Since 2010, the percentage of stayers after five years is 23 to 24 percent. Students from outside Europe, such as Chinese, stay here more often (38 percent) than former students from the European Economic Area (19 percent). One explanation is that the latter students can work anywhere in the EEA, while non-EEA graduates have much less freedom of movement with their visas.
Technical graduates are the ones who most often stay in the Netherlands.They mainly find work in Brainport Eindhoven. Among other graduates, the labour market region of Amsterdam is the most popular.
Nuffic estimates that this year’s new batch of foreign students will generate around 1.5 billion euros. The lion’s share, almost 900 million euros, is owed to the more than 9 thousand higher education students from outside Europe.
Of those who stay, about three-quarters have a job, especially in government, education and health care. (HOP, HC)
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