Italians, Indians largest foreign groups graduating at tertiary level in Malta

Italians and Indians made up the bulk of foreign students who graduated at tertiary level from Maltese institutions in 2023, official figures show.

The National Statistics Office last week said 5,833 students graduated at tertiary level in 2023 with a quarter of them being foreigners. From the 1,526 foreign students, 428 were Italians and 424 were Indians.

A breakdown of the statistics by citizenship shows that 4,307 graduates were Maltese, 694 came from other EU countries and 832 hailed from non-EU countries.

Italian graduates in 2023 increased by 2.9% over the previous year, making them by far the largest cohort of EU students to obtain a tertiary degree in Malta. Interestingly, the number of Italian graduates stood at just 143 in 2021.

The second largest cohort of EU graduates came from Germany with 115 students obtaining a tertiary degree in Malta. However, this represented a decrease of 42.8% over the previous year but was still substantially higher than 2021 when only 14 German students graduated in Malta.

Indians were by far the largest cohort of non-EU nationals to obtain a tertiary degree in Malta. In 2023, 424 Indians graduated, representing a 165% increase over the previous year when just 160 obtained a tertiary degree.

The next largest cohort was British students with 37 graduating from Maltese tertiary institutions in 2023, an increase of 10 over the previous year.

American students came a close third with 34 obtaining a tertiary degree in Malta. This represented an increase of 20 students over 2022.

The NSO figures also show that most foreign nationals irrespective of whether they hail from the EU or not, graduated at tertiary level in ‘health and welfare’ areas of study.  A relative majority of Maltese graduates obtained degrees in ‘business, administration and law’.

While 31.6% of Maltese obtained tertiary level qualifications in ‘business, administration and law’, 13.3% did so in ‘health and welfare’ and 13.1% in ‘education’.

By contrast, 46.1% EU nationals who graduated from Maltese institutions did so in ‘health and welfare’, followed by 21% in ‘business, administration and law’.

Among non-EU nationals, 55.2% graduated at tertiary level in ‘health and welfare’, followed by 27.3% in ‘business, administration and law’.

The statistics took into consideration students who attended formal education programmes at tertiary level delivered in Malta, whether online or face-to-face, with a minimum duration of one semester of full-time study, or equivalent in part-time.

The largest share of tertiary graduates (52.5%) attained a qualification at ISCED Level 6 (Bachelor’s degree or equivalent). This was followed by 34.9% of total tertiary graduates who attained a qualification at ISCED Level 7 (Master’s or equivalent).

The majority of graduates in ISCED levels 6 (Bachelor’s or equivalent) and 7 (Master’s or equivalent) were Maltese (81.1% and 77.5% respectively), whilst in ISCED levels 5 (Short-cycle tertiary education) and 8 (Doctoral or equivalent), the majority of graduates were foreign nationals (67.8% and 60.3% respectively).