As population diversifies, Swedish firms start to as well

Like many European enterprises, Svensk Bilprovning faces a major labor problem as the country's graying population reaches retirement age: Over the next five years, it will lose nearly a quarter of its employees.

Magnus Ehrenstråhle, chief executive of the company, which conducts all vehicle inspections in Sweden, knows it will be tough to fill those positions with native Swedes.

"We have difficulty recruiting Swedes with the right background. Not enough people want to do this kind of greasy, messy work anymore," he says. "At the same time, we have people from other countries who can't find work even though they have technical experience. We won't make it unless we turn to these groups."

So Svensk Bilprovning has done something highly unusual for a Swedish company: It has crafted a diversity plan that requires all its regional offices to hire at least one non-Nordic trainee each year.

While American employers have long touted the idea that diversity is good for business, it's still a novel concept for many European companies. But Swedish employers, many labor-market observers here say, are waking up to the fact that first- and second-generation immigrants spend big money on goods and services – more than $30 billion a year, according to a recent study by Timbro, a Stockholm think tank founded and supported by an employer association.

Between 2001 and 2004, immigrants' buying power rose 9 percent, said the study, released last October. Consumption among immigrants from the Middle East and Africa – regions that will account for most of Sweden's population growth over the next decade – rose 30 percent.

"Employers want to capture this market, and they finally realize that they can't do so unless they diversify their workforce," says Ivan Daza, founder of an employment agency that helps immigrants find jobs. "There is still prejudice out there, but it doesn't weigh as heavily as business profits do."

Skilled migrants have it tough, too

Employers' growing interest in hiring immigrants is good news for residents like Hassan Sabik.

Fluent in Arabic, French, and Swedish, and with a teacher's certificate to boot, Mr. Sabik should be a hot commodity in a job market desperate for foreign-language teachers and Arabic translators.

Instead, Sabik is selling furniture in Rinkeby, a Stockholm suburb with high unemployment and small ethnic shops rarely visited by native Swedes.

"It's just hard to integrate into this society if you're an immigrant and speak with an accent," says Sabik, a Moroccan who's lived here for nine years. "The first thing I heard when I came here was that all immigrants get stuck cleaning offices or doing other menial jobs. So I decided to work for myself instead."

The Somali men sipping coffee at a local Rinkeby cafe echo that. Asked why so many of them can't find work, they describe an invisible wall that still separates many immigrants from Swedes.

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