LANGUAGE NEEDS
[BIZ: Wavre, October 18] Among the training courses, group courses were most common, but there was little financial incentive, with a quarter of the enterprises receiving no funding. The courses were regarded as satisfactory by 59% of the businesses, but 45% thought there were not enough external courses.
The Walloon Business Association (UWE), the Export Association (Awex), Accent Langues, and Forem, an educational organization, held a major enquiry in the spring of 2005 on the use of foreign languages in Walloon enterprises, of which there were about 700. They reached the conclusion that 14% of the businesses were unable to fill jobs because of the absence of linguistic competence — this amounted to 149 jobs. Multilingualism is increasingly necessary for management and others in industry and businesses with a staff of more than 50. In businesses with less than ten staff, workers are more often exposed to the need for multilingualism. All areas saw the need for languages, with English and Dutch being the most important. In businesses with more than 50 staff English is most important, but with the smaller businesses Dutch took the lead. Forty percent of the businesses questioned, said that their staff were following language courses. There is a correspondence between the need for multilingual staff and organized training.
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