World Migration 2005: Costs and Benefits of International Migration

There is no country in the world that is not touched by migration. By early 2005, the number of migrants worldwide is expected to have reached between 185 and 192 million, half of them women. More people are moving temporarily, or circulating between countries, working and living between different cultures, and following opportunities for work and life enhancement offered by today’s globalized economies. This is bringing countries and cultures closer together. Migrants increasingly help to forge close trade, business and cultural links between their countries of origin and host countries. Where it is managed carefully, migration can strengthen economic growth and alleviate poverty in developing countries, and help draw developing countries into the global economy. In developed countries, it is already serving to mitigate chronic population decline and labour shortages. But, where migration is allowed to flourish clandestinely at the hands of smugglers and traffickers, it also exacts a high human cost. Since the last World Migration report in 2003, the general understanding of the complex causes and effects of migration has broadened and deepened, perhaps best exemplified by the many international dialogues and consultative mechanisms that have sprung up or consolidated themselves in the interval. More governments than ever before are engaged in new migration fora, such as the UN’s Global Commission on International Migration or IOM’s International Dialogue on Migration, in a mutual endeavour to explore multilateral approaches to migration management. World Migration 2005, the third in this series, offers a geographic, thematic and statistical update of global migration today. While comprehensive, it is not exhaustive, reflecting the volatile nature of migration. The central theme of “costs and benefits of international migration” responds to the need of policymakers of better evaluate the cause and impacts of migration, in social, economic and political terms, and make rational, well-informed policy choices capable of maximizing the benefits and minimizing the costs of migration for migrants, society and governments.