Migration

*This post has also been cross-posted in the FPA’s Latin America Blog.

Behind oil export and above tourism, remittances from Mexicans abroad to their home country makes up a large part of the cash that builds homes and futures in many Mexican communities. With the recent economic crisis in the US, America’s neighbours are starting to feel the fallout of the Mortgage Crisis that is slowly presenting problems in countries outside of the G8. With many Mexicans living in the US in hard hit areas, those funds that used to pay for medicine, food, homes and everything else for families of migrants from Mexico are now suddenly being cut off with great effect.

With a decline in remittances of 7% since last year, many in Mexico who were just keeping afloat may slip into poverty this year. Many small villages who sent their young men and women over the border and who often are mired in economic troubles are the hardest hit communities in Mexico when economic troubles loom. With remittances to Mexico increasing five and a half times since 1997 to $24 billion, these funds are not only a necessity, but is Mexico’s second largest source of foreign revenue. What also seems to focus the tension on Mexico is that areas in the US where Mexicans have migrated to are also those worst hit by the crisis. While migrants from El Salvador and Guatemala are also affected, those communities often have settled in the Washington-Maryland areas which have been less affected by the crisis according to The Washington Post.

The likely effect of the crisis outside the US may result in more illegal migration across the border. Despite the troubles in the US, communities in Mexico near poverty will not weather the lack of funds as easily as much of the United States. Economies tied in with the US will slowly feel the effects of economic troubles in their largest export market. The lack of sympathy for future trade agreements and harder policies on immigration will also likely take hold with the poor economy and continued anti-NAFTA and FTA sentiments in the US Congress. The next American President will have a lot of repair work when beginning his or her job in 2009.

The weekly news roundup features critical views of the UK points system for highly-skilled migrants, a look at how Wester Union is dominating the remittances market across the world and a preview of France’s new immigration legislation released on November 22nd.
It is becoming ever more attractive to become a US citizen - at least that’s what the latest surge in citizenship applications seems to suggest. In fact, it’s less that naturalization has become more popular over the past months, it is more a combination of a fee increase earlier in the year, fear of new immigration legislation and confusion over green card applications that is causing the bureaucratic backlog that might take up to a year to clear, the New York Times reports.

• Agence France Presse has a stunning article about the tiny village Elinkine in Senegal that is profiting from the droves of illegal immigrants passing through the town to seek a passageway to Europe. In a mafia-type set up, local families profit from “facilitating” migrants’ journeys, i.e. housing them ahead of their departures, and - the article alledges - police pockets are equally fleeced for the same purpose.
• What has five times as many locations worldwide as McDonald’s, Starbucks, Burger King and Wal-Mart combined? Why, Western Union, of course. Powered by immigrant remittances around the globe, the once bankrupt telegraph and communications company now turns a USD 1 billion profit annually. Last year migrants sent home USD 300 billion,nearly three times the world’s foreign aid budgets combined, according to this New York Times article on Western Union.
• In an opinion piece for the Financial Times, Michael Skapinker notes that the new points system to evaluate highly-skilled migrants in the UK has its faults. Geared toward the university educated, well-earning individual, Skapinker fears the new system would keep out precisely those entrepreneurs needed in Great Britain today: the brilliant minds too impatient to sit it out in a classroom, i.e. the Bill Gates and Steve Jobs of this world.
• Also in last week’s FT, Gideon Rachmann ponders the realities of immigration today. He concludes that while economics can be spun both in favor of and against increased immigration flows, governments are likely to pursue restrictive policies. But, he notes that the populist arguments and general anti-immigration stance is losing force in the Western world, partially because: “Voters are more attached to the principles of an open society than the raw polling data on immigration suggest. It is certainly possible to crack down on legal and illegal immigration. But the necessary measures would often involve sacrificing freedom and convenience. You could have much tougher controls at borders - and even longer waiting-times at immigration control. (Forget just hopping on the Eurostar to Paris.) You could introduce identity cards in countries, such as the US and the Netherlands, that have long resisted them. You could bind employers in even more red tape. You could restrict people’s right to marry. You could arrange mass deportations of illegal immigrants and shut your eyes to the resulting injustices. Some combination of all of those measures probably would dramatically reduce immigration. But in the process you would risk creating countries that are not only less welcoming to immigrants. They would probably be much less palatable for native-born citizens as well.”
• France’s new, 65 article strong immigration and asylum legislation was revealed at the end of last week. While I have yet to read the full text, Le Monde offers an initial glimpse here, though again, introducing genetic testing for immigrant minors wishing to accede French territory as highlighted by the paper and detailed in article 13 is hardly new, given the debate on DNA testing an immigration a few months ago. We will cover these legal changes in a separate blog. Meanwhile, however, Jean-Claude Trichet, President of the European Central Bank and one of the prominent Frenchmen on the international stage has implicitly criticised the restrictive new immigration law, pointing to France’s longstanding history as a country of immigration.

This week’s news roundup features stories on a new wave of highly-skilled migrants in newly developed countries, an update on the US’ current most prominent immigrant activist and a look at how remittances are impacting the global economy:

• The New York Times features an article on the mobility of skilled and highly-qualified migrants, who now constitute 69% of global workers on the move. Increasingly, Westerners are moving to former developing countries as new career possibilities emerge in sectors that have long since become established and in some cases less lucrative in their own societies.
• Illegal immigrant Elvira Arellano, who has become a symbol of the immigrant rights movement has been deported to Mexico, after weeks spent in refuge in a Chicago church. There she protested her deportation and separation from her US-born son. Arellano’s story is just one of the many similar fates we have chronicled in the pages of this blog. A can watch a local CBS report on her situation by clicking on this link.
• Again, tragic news from the Canary Islands. Der SPIEGEL reports that another 10 would-be migrants have died off the coast of Spain. Authorities brought 15 refugees to safety, who reported that they had to throw ten bodies - among them two children - overboard, when their fellow passengers died as a consequence of starvation, dehydration and overall exhaustion.
• The Economist covers the plight of many Zimbabwean migrants in South Africa. Over 3m Zimbabweans are thought to have left their homeland (out of a population of 13m), most of them for South Africa. Many are fleeing for purely economic reasons, as Zimbabwe struggles with an 80% unemployment rate - others are political refugees, their bodies covered with signs of torture. South Africa, so the journal reports, is struggling to accomodate the thousands of migrants, which have made it across the border over the past months and problems are set to rise, as a key river bed, which used to deter migrants from risking the trip has now run dry, facilitating illegal border crossings. <>
• <>Remittances have been back in the news recently. Over on the FPA’s Mexico blog, our fellow blogger Rohini Gupta reports that Mexican migrants seem to be sending home less money than in previous years. We featured a similar story a few weeks back. The International Herald Tribune took a closer look at the global impact of remittances, which “are larger than direct foreign investment in Mexico, tea exports in Sri Lanka, tourism revenue in Morocco, and revenue from the Suez Canal in Egypt,” according to World Bank economist Dilip Ratha.
• While most of Europe faces a dramatic demographic downturn, which will put a squeeze on established pension systems, Ireland is looking at a population boom, partially due to the country’s economic growth, partially due to a larger number of migrants over the past few years. Thus, the country has been increasing its integration efforts, as the International Herald Tribune reports.

The Washington Post is reporting that remittance payments from US resident immigrants to Latin American countries has slowed down over the past two months. While remittances are subject to cyclical economics, much like any other payments, analysts are speculating whether this could signal a more profound shift:

“Many remittance-rich nations would fall into a recession if immigrants began sending home significantly less money, which could encourage more poor Latin Americans to find work in the United States, according to the study and Donald Terry, manager of the Multilateral Investment Fund at the Inter-American Development Bank.”

The article highlights the important role that remittances play in Central American economies, such as Honduras and El Salvador, where they constitute 18 percent of the national income and surpass foreign aid and investment, according to a study by the think tank, Inter-American Dialogue.

The Inter-American Development Bank is studying possible reasons for sluggish payments, noting that anecdotal evidence suggests that raids on migrant communities by U.S. law enforcement officers and fear of deportation has prompted some to curb spending. Other reasons may be saving money to pay U.S. citizenship fees, wagering that a congressional debate over immigration law would result in allowing them to pay a penalty and legalize their immigration status. A downturn in the U.S. housing industry could also be trickling down to immigrants, who fill the majority of U.S. construction jobs.”

For further reading on the role of remittances in aiding developing countries, please take a look at these documents:

• “The role of remittances in the World’s Economy”, Immigration Policy Brief, The American Immigration Law Foundation, 2003.
• The Migration Information Source of the Migration Policy Institute has a full overview of the topic, including special coverage of the ‘Year of Migration and Development’ 2006.
• “Migration and Remittances”, an overview compiled by the World Bank.
• “Close to home - The Development Impact of Remittances in Latin America,” World Bank Report, 2006 (pdf).
• “Card-based Remittances: A closer look at supply and demand,” Inter-American Dialogue, 2007 (pdf).
• “International Flows of Remittances: Cost, Competition and Financial Access in Latin America and the Caribbean–Toward an Industry Scorecard,”  Inter-American Development Bank, 2006 (please scroll down the list of documents to download the PDF from the IADB’s website).
• “Migrants’ Remittances,” Ch. 2 of a World Bank report on Migration Trends in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, 2006. To access the report in full, take a look at the World Bank’s website on the topic.