We are all from somewhere else.

Key facts about migration

Human migration has become a matter of global concern, as migration has increased and affects every country in the world.

• 214 million - estimated number of international migrants worldwide in 2009

• 5th country - migrant would constitute the fifth most populous country in the world

• 30-40 million - estimated number of undocumented migrants worldwide

• $414 billion - estimated remittances sent by migrants in 2009

• 27.1 million - internally displaced persons in the world in 2009

• 3.1 % - percentage of the world’s population who are migrants

• 49% - percentage of migrants worldwide who are women

• $ 316 billion - estimated remittances sent by migrants to developing countries in 2009

• 15.2 million - estimated number of refugees in the world in 2009

• 740 million - number of internal migrants in 2009 according to United Nations, four times as many as number of international migrants

• 50 million - number of jobs lost due to current economic crisis according to International Labour Organization

• 2.45 million - estimated by International Labour Organization as the number of trafficked victims who are living in exploitive conditions

• Aging populations and fall in working age population in most industrialized countries will cause a growing labour surplus in many developing countries.

• Economic crisis makes migrants more vulnerable: xenophobia and a danger of blaming migrants for political and socio - economic unrest.

• Lack of respect for the human rights of migrants reduces their ability to contribute to development.

Laws of migration

In a paper delivered to the Journal of the Statistical Society in England in 1885, Ernest George Ravenstein, a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society, outlined a series of "laws of migration" that attempted to explain and predict migration patterns both within and between nations. Ravenstein's basic laws, and additional laws subsequently derived from his work, continue to serve as the starting point for virtually all serious models of migration patterns over a century later. For his migration study, Ravenstein compared census data gathered in 1871 and 1881, the most recent tabulations available at the time. Although Ravenstein's paper only focused on information gleaned from surveys within the United Kingdom, he made the bold jump of formulating from his observations a series of  "laws of migration":

1. The majority of migrants go only a short distance By way of illustration, almost half of emigrants from Latin America in the 1990s arrived in the United States, and the main destinations of Tunisians and Moroccans is France, Italy and Spain. Second, they tend to come from middle-income rather than the poorest developing countries. OECD noted that a large proportion of migration in the developing world remains intra-regional and does not cross into OECD countries. For example Africa, the continent with the largest number of least developed countries, shows low rates of emigration to OECD countries.
2. Migration proceeds step by step
3. Migrants going long distances generally prefer to go to one of the great centers of commerce and industry
4. Each current of migration encourages a compensatory counter current
5. Townspeople are less migratory than people from rural areas
6. Females are more migratory than males within the country of birth, but males move more frequently beyond
7. Most migrants are adults:  Families rarely migrate out of the country of their birth
8. Large towns grow more by migration than by natural increase
9. Migration increases in volume as industries and commerce develop and transport improves
10. The major direction of migration is from agricultural areas to the centers of industry and commerce
11. The major causes of migration are economics