Portugal sees exodus of skilled workers seeking better prospects Students at Castelo Branco City University of Technologies at a presentation about job and traineeship opportunities Vanda Dias, a 34-year-old nurse at Lisbon's sprawling Santa Maria hospital, has just finished a 24-hour shift. Artur Colares, a trauma nurse with 20 years experience, works 80 hours a week in two jobs. Neither has had a pay increase for years. Both want to emigrate. "I feel completely blocked in my career without any prospect of progress," says Ms Dias, whose salary has not gone up since she became a nurse 12 years ago. "Careers in nursing have been frozen for the past decade," says Mr Colares, who, at 44, needs two jobs to bring in what he initially projected he could earn from one. Many experienced professionals like them are swelling a wave of emigration by some of Portugal's best qualified workers as university leavers seeking better opportunities abroad are joined by skilled people in their thirties and forties who feel stuck in dead-end careers. João Miguel Rodriques, 41, is a photojournalist with three children under 11. His wife is also a nurse. "We both have our professional ambitions, but feel our careers are stuck," he says. We're thinking about emigrating because we sense we won't be able to move much further ahead in Portugal. Emigration has surged in recent years, reaching levels similar to Portugal's biggest exodus in the 1960s. Officials and researchers say at least 100,000 people are leaving each year, almost the equivalent of one person emigrating every five minutes and similar to the Irish emigration rate. "In a country of 10m people, that represents a huge wave of emigration," says João Peixoto, a sociologist who works with Portugal's Emigration Observatory. The difference this time is that, unlike the poorly educated, largely agricultural workers who left in the 1960s, today's emigrants have university degrees and are often highly skilled professionals. "We're losing some of our best and brightest," says Mr Peixoto. The people who are leaving now are young, urban and educated. Struggling to comply with the terms of a €78bn bailout, Portugal has seen unemployment among under-25s soar above 37 per cent, compared with a total jobless rate of 16.4 per cent. Young graduates have been among the hardest hit, with a jobless rate that is slightly higher than overall youth unemployment. The country's deep recession has taken its toll on the largest and best qualified generation of graduates in Portugal's history, the percentage of 30 to 34-year-olds with a university education having doubled to 24 per cent during the past decade. The percentage of Portuguese students achieving PhDs is also one of the highest in Europe, says Mr Peixoto. "Portugal has invested a great deal of money to train the people it's now losing," says Daniel Traça, the deputy dean of Lisbon's Nova School of Business and Economics. Our focus now should be on reforming the economy to make sure they come back in a few years. According to researchers, London has become one of the most attractive cities for the best qualified Portuguese emigrants, particularly nurses, IT engineers and financial specialists. Ms Dias and Mr Colares were among 50 nurses recently interviewed at a Lisbon hotel by recruiters from two British National Health Service trusts. Portugal has invested a great deal of money to train the people it's now losing. Our focus now should be on reforming the economy to make sure they come back in a few years Daniel Traça, deputy dean of Lisbon's Nova School of Business and Economics Portuguese nurses, who earn approximately €1,300 a month, can more than double their salaries in Britain, where some experienced hospital staff are being offered around €40,000 a year. In some Gulf states, qualified Portuguese nurses are being offered about €7,000 a month tax-free. Mr Colares believes he could earn as much from one job abroad as he does from two full-time jobs in Portugal. But it's not just about the money, he says. The National Health Service in Portugal is being gradually destroyed and that demotivates the professionals working there. Ms Dias says: "I have my whole life in front of me, but my career prospects are very limited in Portugal. I think I'd find more opportunities to develop and specialise abroad and gain more social recognition for the job I do. Many experienced professionals who feel stranded in their careers are also unsure if job prospects will improve for their children. "I'm afraid that they will finish their education without any certainty of being able to provide for themselves," says Mr Rodrigues. Mr Colares says he is also encouraging his eldest daughter, who is about to begin university, to emigrate. "I don't see much of a future for her in Portugal over the medium term," he says. Marta Lopes, a 23-year-old postgraduate student, plans to go abroad for a year and then return. "I really want a job in Portugal and I will work hard to get it," she says. But most of my colleagues want to leave and are not planning to come back so soon.