Germany is set to open several new Foreigners' Offices (Ausländerbehörden) specially designed to reduce the country’s worker shortage. Here’s what you need to know about the project.

Baden-Württemberg to open new Ausländerbehörden amid worker shortage

Baden-Württemberg is set to open a new kind of Ausländerbehörde “as soon as possible” to help Germany plug its worker shortage more efficiently. 55 administrative employees will be hired at the centres in Karlsruhe and Stuttgart, which will operate alongside the existing, regular Ausländerbehörden.

The new Landesagentur für die Fachkräftezuwanderung (LZF) will, “provide expert advice and efficient administration to enable skilled workers to enter Germany quickly and un- bureaucratically,” according to a press release from the federal state.

While the project was first announced in July 2024, a spokesperson for Baden-Württemberg Minister for Migration Marion Gentges (CDU) has clarified that the office will begin work “as soon as possible”. 

When the offices open, skilled workers who arrive in Germany to work in the health and care sector will have their documents processed at the LZF office in Stuttgart. Newcomers qualified to work in all other sectors will be processed at the Karlsruhe office.

“According to our recent business survey, the worker shortage poses one of the biggest risks for businesses in our country,” Stuttgart Chamber of Commerce (IHK) director Claus Paal told Süddeutsche Zeitung in conversation about the project. The IHK’s Skilled Worker Monitor predicts that Baden-Württemberg will be short of 910.000 employees by 2035.

Accelerated processing centre will also open in Lower Saxony

Baden-Württemberg isn’t alone in its plans. In Lower Saxony, the SPD-Green coalition has announced that a new centralised office will accelerate documentation processing for skilled workers arriving in the state from outside Germany.

In the case of Lower Saxony, the new centralised office will take over the task from the federal state’s 52 communal Ausländerbehörden, starting in the first half of 2025. “This will lead to standardised procedures and a pooling of expertise and experience,” said the state chancellery.

Under the federal state's new system, employers will also be able to pay a 411 euro fee to the administrative office if they have offered a third-country national a skilled job and would like to accelerate their new employee's visa application process.

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