On 21 July 2026 the European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training (Cedefop) updated its Skills Forecast, the tool that projects European employment trends up to 2035 by country, sector and occupation. The 2026 edition introduces two new elements: analysis of replacement demand and, within medium-level qualifications, a distinction between vocational and general pathways. The projections sit within a demographic picture that Eurostat describes as structurally contracting.
The tool and the 2026 update
The Skills Forecast provides quantitative projections of employment trends built on macro-economic modelling and harmonised international data. Its geographical coverage includes the twenty-seven Member States of the European Union, together with Iceland, Norway, the Republic of North Macedonia, Switzerland and Türkiye, allowing comparisons across countries on a consistent basis. The tool is part of Cedefop’s Skills Intelligence suite, which also includes Skills-OVATE, based on job advertisements published online, and STAS, the short-term anticipation of skills trends and vocational education and training demand.
The two additions in the 2026 release answer different needs. Replacement demand measures the need to fill posts vacated by workers leaving an occupation, primarily through retirement: it is a component of labour demand that does not depend on economic growth and that tends to be underestimated when only net job creation is considered. The disaggregation of medium-level qualifications separates vocational from general pathways, giving a more granular picture of skills supply. The Cedefop Labour and Skills Shortage Index (CLSSI), which projects shortages at the level of individual occupations, has been updated in parallel.
Employment projections by sector
Overall, employment across the twenty-seven Member States is projected to grow by more than 4 per cent between 2023 and 2035. The pattern, however, differs considerably by sector and by country.
Among expanding occupations, information and communication technology (ICT) professionals and technicians show projected annual employment growth of 2.5 per cent on average across the Union, ranging from 1.3 per cent in Italy and Germany to 7.8 per cent in Romania. Electricity generation is among the sectors with the highest projected annual growth rates, at around 2 per cent, reaching above 4 per cent in some countries (Malta, the Netherlands, Romania and Luxembourg). Research and development, computer services and architectural and engineering activities are among the fastest-growing sectors, with annual increases above 7 per cent in Romania and above 3 per cent in Estonia and Denmark. Population ageing also drives demand in human health activities and related occupations, including personal care work, where employment is projected to grow by almost 1 per cent a year.
On the other side, coal records the steepest projected annual employment decline of any sector, at 10.7 per cent, followed by manufactured fuels with a contraction of 4.4 per cent a year.
Age composition of the workforce and skills shortages
The Cedefop projections point to a recomposition of the European workforce by age. The labour force aged sixty-five and over is projected to grow at an annual rate above 7 per cent, with wide variation between Member States: from around 2 per cent in Belgium, Estonia, Hungary and Latvia to over 10 per cent in Romania, Greece, Slovenia, France and Croatia. The cohort aged thirty to fifty-four is expected to shrink by 0.2 per cent a year. Female labour force participation is forecast to grow slightly faster than male participation, narrowing the gender gap further.
CLSSI data flag mounting pressures in high-skilled occupations, namely managers, professionals and associate professionals. The projected shortages have no single origin: they stem from demand growth, from the scale of replacement needs and from mismatches between available and required qualifications.
The demographic background
The skills projections are read alongside the demographic projections published by Eurostat on 16 April 2026. In 2025 the population of the European Union was estimated at 451.8 million; it is expected to keep growing for a few more years, peaking at 453.3 million in 2029, before declining gradually to 398.8 million by 2100. Over the period from 2025 to 2100 the overall reduction is 11.7 per cent, equal to 53.0 million people.
The age structure changes as well. The share of the working-age population, conventionally those aged twenty to sixty-four, is projected to fall from 58 per cent in 2025 to 50 per cent in 2100. The share of children and young people up to nineteen declines from 20 to 17 per cent, while the group aged sixty-five to seventy-nine moves from 16 to 17 per cent and those aged eighty and over grow by ten percentage points, from 6 to 16 per cent. Eurostat notes that projections are not forecasts: they are scenarios built on assumptions of partial convergence in fertility, mortality and net migration, and should be read as one among a range of possible demographic developments.
Outlook
Skills Forecast data are intended to feed the European policy frameworks on skills: the Union of Skills, the forthcoming Union strategy on vocational education and training, the Digital Decade, the AI Continent Action Plan and the Competitiveness Compass. For vocational education and training providers and for the social partners, CLSSI data offer an early signal for curriculum development, capacity planning and social dialogue on upskilling and apprenticeships. Country-level projections allow policymakers to benchmark national trends against the average of the twenty-seven and to target investment where shortages and demographic pressures are most acute.
The operational steps remain to be settled: calibrating national training provision to the occupations flagged as short, measures on qualification recognition and adult learning funding, and how replacement demand will be incorporated into national planning, which so far has looked mainly at net job creation. The content of the Union strategy on vocational education and training has not yet been adopted.
In dialogue with the 2030 Agenda
- Goal 4 (Quality Education). The projections show where vocational education and training provision needs to be calibrated against the shortages expected up to 2035.
- Goal 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth). Replacement demand and shortages in high-skilled occupations affect the resilience of employment in European labour markets.
- Goal 10 (Reduced Inequalities). Gaps between Member States in projected growth rates, and the trend in female labour market participation, measure distances within the Union.
- Goal 13 (Climate Action). Falling employment in coal and growth in electricity generation reflect the energy transition under way.
Sources
- Cedefop, Cedefop updates Skills Forecast (21 July 2026)
- Cedefop, Skills Forecast (online tool)
- Cedefop, Labour and Skills Shortage Index
- Cedefop, Skills forecast (project)
- Eurostat, EU’s population projected to drop by 11.7% by 2100 (16 April 2026)
- Eurostat, Population projections (thematic section)
