News Highlights:
- Recently, the World Development Report 2023: Migrants, Refugees, and Societies was released by the World Bank.
- The World Development Report has estimated a 120% income gain for Indians going to work overseas, compared to a 40% rise in the case of internal migration.
World Development Report:
- About
- The World Bank publishes the World Development Report (WDR) annually. It has been published since 1978.
- The latest world bank report is the World Development Report 2023 which was released by the World Bank in April 2023.
- It provides an in-depth analysis of a specific aspect of economic development.
Highlights of the 2023 Report:
- Hike in Income:
- Under-skilled Indian citizens migrating to the US noticed a hike in their income of nearly 500%, followed by the UAE by almost 300%.
- Those migrating to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations other than UAE stand to gain less.
- Global Migration and Refugees:
- There are currently 184 million migrants globally, which is 2.3% of the population, including 37 million refugees.
- Migrants Classification:
- The report classified migrants into the following major types:
- Economic migrants with strong skill match (e.g., Indian IT professionals in the US or construction workers in GCC nations)
- Refugees with skills in demand at the destination (e.g., Syrian entrepreneurs in Turkey)
- Distressed migrants (e.g., Some poorly skilled migrants at the US southern border)
- Refugees (e.g., Rohingya in Bangladesh)
- Top Migration Corridors:
- India-US, India-GCC and Bangladesh-India have been identified to be among the top migration corridors globally, along with Mexico-US, China-US, Philippines-US and Kazakhstan-Russia.
- Increase in Remittances:
- The remittances have increased to some of the countries with a large migrant population, including India, Mexico, China and the Philippines.
- India received the highest ever foreign inward remittances of USD 89,127 million in FY 2021-22.
- In 2021, total global remittances were estimated at USD 781 billion and have further risen to USD794 billion in 2022.
- Adults working decline:
- The share of working-age adults will drop sharply in many countries over the next few decades.
- Spain is projected to shrink by more than one-third by 2100.
Challenges:
- Increase in Inequalities:
- As per the World Bank, migration issues are becoming even more widespread and urgent due to severe divergences between and within countries— in terms of real wages, labour market opportunities, demographic patterns and climate costs.
- Loss of Citizenship:
- A significant number of people do not have citizenship in the country where they reside.
- Less than half of the global migrant population, about 43%, live in low- and middle-income countries.
- This underscores the global nature of the issue of statelessness and highlights the need for action to address it.
- Distressed Migration:
- Some migrants move without skills that match the needs of the destination country and they are not refugees either.
- Such movements are often distressed and irregular and take place under harrowing circumstances.
Pic Courtesy: Freepik
Content Source: Time of India