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Belgium ranks 17th for English language proficiency

05:50 04/11/2015

Belgium ranks 17th in the EF English Proficiency Index 2015, the world's largest ranking of countries by English skills. Flemings have a stronger knowledge of English than Walloons, according to the index. Sweden and the Netherlands rank 1st and 2nd in the list, respectively.

The report identifies English language learning trends and examines the relationship between English proficiency and economic competitiveness. This year's EF EPI report profiles 70 countries, using test data from 910,000 adult English language learners.

Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark rank the highest, with scores above 70. Belgium comes in 17th place worldwide, with an average score of 59.13, a sharp decline compared to last year, when Belgium came in 9th place with an average score of 61.21.

The index shows that Dutch-speakers in Belgium are highly proficient in English, with an average score of 62.20, while Francophones in Belgium have 'decent' proficiency (57.94). Antwerp and Ghent were the highest scoring cities in the list, followed by Brussels.

Although women worldwide generally speak better English than men, the exact opposite appears to be true in Belgium, where men have stronger English skills (60.79) than women (57.47).

Written by Robyn Boyle

Comments

Roger B

As opposed to the countries mentioned above, don't forget that Belgium is a country with 3 national languages, which are primarily teached in secondary schools.
This makes English our 3th language to be learned.

Nov 4, 2015 08:26
jat4

Wish the UK would introduce European language learning in the schools, they are being left behind.

Nov 4, 2015 12:31