Migration

The number of international migrants, or people residing in a country other than their country of birth, has increased more or less linearly over the past 40 years, from an estimated 76 million in 1965 to 188 million in 2005.

FACTS AND FIGURES(Latest 2009)

Global Estimates and Trends

214 million

Estimated number of international migrants

worldwide

The total number of international migrants has increased over the last 10 years from an estimated 150 million in 2000 to 214 million persons today.

3.1%

Percentage of the world's population who are migrants

In other words, one of out of every 33 persons in the world today is a migrant (whereas in 2000 one out of every 35 persons was a migrant). The percentage of migrants has remained relatively stable as a share of the

total population, increasing by only 0.2 per cent (from 2.9 to 3.1 per cent), over the last decade. However, the percentage of migrants varies greatly from country to country. Countries with a high percentage of migrants include Qatar (87 per cent), United Arab Emirates (70 per cent), Jordan (46 per cent), Singapore (41 per cent), and Saudi Arabia (28 per cent). Countries with a low percentage of migrants include South Africa (3.7 per cent), Slovakia (2.4 per cent), Turkey (1.9 per cent), Japan (1.7 per cent), Nigeria (0.7 per cent), Romania (0.6 per cent), India (0.4 per cent) and Indonesia (0.1 per cent).

5th
the world

Migrants would constitute the fifth most populous country in

Migration is now more widely distributed across more countries. Today the top 10 countries of destination receive a smaller share of all migrants than in 2000.

49%

Percentage of migrants worldwide who are women

$414 billion

Estimated remittances sent by migrants in 2009

Remittances have increased exponentially: up from USD 132 billion in 2000 to an estimated USD 414 billion in 2009, even with a slight decline due to the current economic crisis.11 The actual amount, including unrecorded flows through formal and informal channels, is believed to be significantly larger. In 2009, the top recipient countries of recorded remittances were India, China, Mexico, the Philippines, and Poland. Rich countries are the main source of remittances. The United States is by far the largest, with USD 46 billion in recorded outward flows in 2008. Russia ranks as the second largest, followed by Switzerland and Saudi Arabia.

$307 billion

Estimated remittances sent by migrants to developing countries in 2009

In 2009, more than USD 307 billion in remittances went to developing countries representing some 74 per cent of total remittances.This is up from USD 83 billion and 63 per cent in 2000. Recorded remittances are more than twice as large as official aid and nearly two-thirds of foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to developing countries.

27.1 million

2009.

Internally displaced persons in the world in 2009

IDP numbers have grown from 21 million in 2000 to 27 million at the end of

15.2 million

Number of refugees in the world today

Based on data from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the number of refugees stood at 15.2 million in 2009 compared to 15.9 million in 2000 a decline of

around 700,000. However, due to a change in classification and estimation methodology in a number of countries, figures as from 2007 are not fully comparable with pre-2007 figures. Using a different methodology, data from the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants suggest that the number of refugees has decreased from 14 million in 2000 to around 13.6 million in 2009. The proportion of refugees in migrant stocks has fallen from 8.8 per cent in 2000 to 7.6 per cent in 2010.

International Paradoxes

Migration

and

Development

Puzzles

and

Recent economic studies suggest that migration and development are closely linked to one another: development shapes migration, and migration, in turn, influences development, in ways that are sometimes surprising and often not recognized by Paradoxes and puzzles abound. Under-development drives migration, but migration also affects underdevelopment Income gaps between rich and poor countries create incentives for international migration, but they are a necessarynot a sufficient condition. Most people do not migrate, even when incomes are far higher abroad than at home. Income growth in migrant-sending areas often is associated with more international migration, not less. In all countries that experience rapid income growth, the share of people in farm jobs and in rural areas goes down. International migration is driven by networks, whether through contacts with others who have migrated or through recruitment. Once international migration from a particular region reaches a certain point, it tends to take on a life of its own. Half of the worlds international migrants are women, whose motives for migrating, constraints, concerns and impacts on sending areas often are different than those of males

ENVIRONMENTAL CAUSES The environment has always shaped the movement of people and the distribution of the human population across the planet. Throughout history, people have left places with harsh or deteriorating conditions, and nomadic peoples have traditionally opted for seasonal migration to maintain their livelihoods in sensitive ecosystems. The droughts between 1930 and 1936 in the American Dust Bowl displaced hundreds of thousands of people, and the droughts that struck Africas Sahelian region in the 1970s forced millions of farmers and nomads towards cities. But over the last two decades, the nature and scale of environmentally induced population movements have begun to change. While no reliable figures exist, the growing certainty about the impacts of climate change suggest that an increasing number of people will migrate mainly for environmental reasons in the future.

FUTURE ENVIRONMENT MIGRATION TRENDS Large-scale population movement is likely to intensify as changing climate leads to the abandonment of flooded or arid and inhospitable environments, according to The Lancet. The resulting mass migration will lead to many serious health problems both directly, from the various stresses of the migration process, and indirectly, from the possible civil strife that could be caused by chaotic movement of people. Millions of people now living in low-lying coastal areas may need to leave their homes if sea levels rise as predicted by most climate-change experts. Protracted and severe droughts may drive more farmers from rural areas to cities to seek new livelihoods. Residents of urban slums in flood-prone areas may migrate to rural areas to escape danger. And in some instances, gradual environmental degradation may erase income-earning opportunities, driving some across national boundaries. The reasons for which people migrate or seek refuge are complex, making it hard to forecast how climate change will affect the future of migration. Climate change nonetheless seems likely to become a major force for future population movement, probably mostly through internal displacement but also to some extent through international migration.