According to English Proficiency Index report, English was mastered on the highest level by inhabitants of Scandinavian countries (on the first place is Denmark) and Holland. Poland is on the sixth place, exceeding such countries as Germany or Switzerland. In comparison with the previous edition, Poland enhanced its position by two places.
Within last three years, that is from the moment we started running this ranking, Poland is still increasing its position. The ranking is very correlated with economic development, different indexes of civil society development, penetration of the Internet and easiness in running business. All those relations are noticeable – explains Piotr Majdan, country manager in Education First.
In the third edition of EPI ranking, Poland was on the 8th place and it was exceeded by i.a. Austria. This year, Austria fell on the seventh place. At present, among regions with the lowest competences in the area of English language there are the Middle East and the South-East Asia. The lowest positions in the ranking belong to Libya, Saudi Arabia, Iraq or Cambodia.
The people speak English the most fluently in countries where the easiness of establishing a company or running a business, taxation and fiscal system are visible. Poland maintains those proportions and Scandinavian countries have those systems the easiest. I am very glad that Poland is joining this group – says Piotr Majdan.
The results are differentiated in respect of age and sex. Young people and women are the best English speakers. Poland is not an exception in this case.
English Proficiency Index is the biggest international ranking, the aim of which is to measure the level of knowledge of the English language in countries where it is not official. The survey was conducted for the fourth time this year. Furthermore, over 750 thousand people over 18 participated in it. The ranking includes 63 countries.