India is hoping that the European Union's proposal for the blue card will incorporated into a bilateral trade and investment agreement being negotiated between India and the 27-member bloc.

According to the Economic Times, senior commerce ministry officials said that they hoped the EU would provide provisions specific to India to make the scheme more "relevant for the country's needs."

During a 6 December 2007 meeting of justice, interior, and employment ministers in Brussels, Germany's employment minister, Olaf Scholz, said that European Commission plans for the blue card immigration program were not needed.

"We have 3.5 million unemployed and that means that companies can find workers within Germany," Scholz said. According to Scholz, specific shortages could be addressed from within Germany for each sector lacking workers.

Writing in the official journal of the South African Institute of Measurement and Control (SAIMC), editor Andrew Ashton says that South Africa's plan to allow skilled migrants to come to the country to find work without a job offer is unattractive compared to the European Union's proposed blue card immigration scheme.

"We know that there are problems relating to the education, development and training for engineers in South Africa, and various companies and organizations are addressing these issues in different ways," Ashton wrote.

The two newest members of the European Union, Bulgaria and Romania, are both dealing with wage increases and an exodus of skilled workers.

According to the World Bank, 38 percent of firms in Bulgaria and Romania each are reporting difficulties in finding skilled workers.

At the end of 2006, unemployment in Romania was at 5.2 percent, down from 7 percent in 2003 and continuing to drop. Wages continue to grow at the same time, at approximately 20 percent per year since 2002.

Health ministers from African countries are worried that the European Union's proposed blue card will drain the developing world of its skilled workers.

"We cannot afford schemes that seek to cream the very limited health skills we still have in developing countries," South Africa health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang told Sapa news agency.

The ministers were expressing their worries at a ministerial session of 79 African, Caribbean and Pacific countries (ACP) in Belgium on 26 October 2007.