The chief executive of Hays, Alistair Cox, says the company’s report on critical skills imbalances paints “a deeply worrying picture of the world’s labour forces”.

Speaking at the launch of the Hays Global Skills Index 2012, produced in collaboration with Oxford Economics, Cox said that despite the global economic slowdown and high levels of unemployment, employers in two-thirds of the 27 countries covered in the report said “there was a lack of skills”.

This suggested “a fundamental mismatch between the skills needed, and the ability of systems (such as education systems) to balance that”, he said. 

The index shows the state of the market for skilled labour in 27 key economies across five regions of the world in which Hays operates.

Measured on a scale between 0 and 10, with a higher figure indicating a greater degree of difficulty in hiring skilled labour, the report found wide variations. Belgium and Italy both scored 3.3, indicating an over supply of candidates. However both the US and Germany, where there are significant skill shortages, scored 6.4.

The UK’s index was 5.0. But even in the UK, with its currently weak economy, Cox said that 80% of employers reported “some sort of problem” in recruiting the skilled talent they needed. 

Cox said the imbalance between what firms need and the skills available had serious implications. “Economic growth is restricted, a lack of future investment and fewer opportunities for lower skilled, and to create the opportunities for more jobs and deal with the long-tail of unemployment.”

As Recruiter reported yesterday, Hays called for a three-point action plan for governments and employers to address the issue.