The Ramphal Commission on Migration and Development has been examining the effects of environmental change on migration and the consequences for small states whose skilled people are being lost to developed countries.
To migrate from one country to another is not a decision taken lightly, as it has consequences not only for an individual but for families and communities, in both the sending and receiving countries. While the sum of these decisions can make a lot of media noise in states like the UK and France, it also quietly saps the development efforts of others like Guyana or Zambia, which suffer high levels of skilled emigration.
In today’s interdependent world, where knowledge of opportunity cannot be kept secret, international migration is a growing phenomenon. In the last decade, the number of people living outside their country of birth jumped from around 150 million to some 214 million. The Commonwealth of 54 states, responsible for about a fifth of these movements, has been waking up to the complexity of the issue.
Last year, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association debated the issue in Nairobi, and several governments, including the CARICOM group, have requested that migration is on the agenda for the forthcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Perth, Australia. At the same time, the Ramphal Commission on Migration and Development, chaired by the former prime minister of Jamaica, P. J. Patterson, is releasing a series of reports that aim to take the toxicity out of the discussion, and to make practical proposals for policy.
The latest report, prepared for the Commission by Professor Elizabeth Thomas Hope of the University of the West Indies, focuses on two issues: environmental impacts on migration, and the loss of highly trained personnel from small or least developed states. While in 2001 it was reckoned that 25 million people could be classified as environmentally displaced, Christian Aid’s more recent forecast is that this number could increase tenfold by around 2050. The presidents of both Maldives and Kiribati have made it clear that their entire populations are at risk of removal because of potential inundation.
The situation is equally serious for the migration of skilled persons. Of the world’s top 27 countries sending tertiary-educated emigrants to the developed OECD states, 24 are Commonwealth members. In Zambia, only 50 out of the 600 doctors trained since independence are still practising in the country. In Guyana, where 300 teachers qualify each year, the same number emigrates annually.
So what can be done? The Commission, in its two reports so far, is recommending that Commonwealth member states manage migration better by improving their knowledge of who is coming and going. Developing states should also incorporate the migration factor in their own development policies, thereby making the home economy more attractive to potential emigrants. Partnerships should be established between sending and receiving countries, and migrants encouraged to share their success, by expanding markets and personal effort as well as through remittances. Finally, the Commission calls for more international cooperation, with sensitive and transparent recruitment policies, and protection for environmentally induced migrants.
The latest report also challenges some prevailing notions. It points out that those who are threatened by environmental change – for example, sea level rises or, as in the case of Montserrat, volcanic eruptions – have the right to stay put if they can.
Where change is gradual, adaptation can be managed. But this may not always be possible. Writing of Tuvalu, a Pacific atoll state that has already suffered environmental degradation and economic decline, the report calls for an urgent assessment of its chances for viability, concluding that: “If there is consensus that the battle for environmental survival has been lost, then plans for evacuation need to be pursued and supported by the international community.”
The Commission points out that while the large majority of international migration is South-South, much of the migration of highly trained persons is from developing to developed countries. There have been no systematic empirical studies of the impact on developing countries of this emigration, but the Commission argues that members of the diaspora will only invest in their home country if there is a buoyant home economy with secure financial instruments, and encouragement must be given to migrant entrepreneurs. In Guyana, for example, remittances seem to have been important in reducing the proportion of those living below the poverty line from 65 percent in 1988 to 35 percent in 2002. However, they have not provided investment for growth, and our research has shown that by paying for school fees, relatives in the diaspora may actually be encouraging the subsequent emigration of young adults.
The Commonwealth is largely built on international migration and has important experiences to share. The Ramphal Commission, which is an independent expert body with a Commonwealth focus, is hopeful that a number of its practical suggestions will be adopted at the Commonwealth leaders’ meeting in Perth in October. Already there are discussions going on between the Commonwealth Secretariat and the International Organization for Migration on the training of officials concerned with education and health. Studies coordinated by the Food and Agriculture Organization, the Commonwealth Foundation and the Ramphal Centre in London will lead to proposals on how diaspora groups can contribute to food security and improved agriculture in countries of origin.
