New figures from national agency Statistics Denmark, analysed by trade union Dansk Metal, show employment rates among people from backgrounds considered ‘non-Western’ are historically high.

The figures show that 58.7 percent of non-Western immigrants aged between 15 and 64 were in salaried employment in Denmark in the first quarter of 2022.

That represents the highest figure at any point during the 14 years it has been recorded.

Dansk Metal’s senior economist Erik Bjørsted called the data ”really positive”.

“Historically, non-Western immigrants have regrettably had a very weak connection to the labour market. They are also still behind employment rates of Danes,” Bjørsted said.

“But they are narrowing the gap, so we are definitely on the right track,” he said.

Favourable conditions on the Danish labour market are partly to thank for the positive trend, he noted.

In official data, Denmark categorises all EU and EEA countries, along with Andorra, Australia, Canada, Monaco, New Zealand, San Marino, the United Kingdom, United States and the Vatican as ‘Western’. Everywhere else is ‘non-Western’.

The ‘non-Western’ categorisation is sometimes further divided into MENAPT (Middle East, North Africa, Pakistan and Turkey) and all other non-Western countries.