Dec.18, is World Migration Day: People seeking a better life

US farms can't find enough workers.

Today, December 18, is International Migrants Day. More people are moving across the globe, fleeing violence or natural disasters or seeking opportunities and safety in other countries.

In 2019, the number of migrants worldwide continued to increase. Over the past 12 months, 272 million people, representing 3.5% of the world's population, have been driven to seek a better future elsewhere. Some are seeking new economic and employment opportunities, while others, such as refugees and asylum seekers, have been overwhelmed by their situation, and are fleeing war, persecution, hunger or disease.

Many of these problems are caused by climate change: Farmlands become infertile, wells run dry, ocean levels rise, stronger weather events.
In the United States, we see the thousands of people at the Mexico-US border, migrants and refugees from Latin America -- and surprisingly, from Africa and Asia. South Asians and Chinese pay years of earnings to human smuggling operations to enter the US illegally.

On Tuesday (Dec. 17) Myanmar authorities seized a boat filled with hundreds of Muslim refugees from northern Rakhine State who tried to get from Bangladesh to Malaysia. 

Over 1 million Rohingya have fled Myanmar to refugee camps in Bangladesh and Thailand.

The migration of war-weary Syrians  and Kurds into neighboring countries, the movement of Africans across the Mediterranean Sea into Europe have created a backlash fueled by racism, much like the Trump-inspired white supremacist movement in the US.

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Less known is the massive ongoing migration from the poorer countries in Asia to wealthier countries like Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. The number of documented migrant workers in Southeast Asia and the Pacific is an estimated 11.6 million - 5.2 million of whom are women.

The so-called Philippine Diaspora is real, a result of Filipinos seeking economic opportunities abroad. Ten million Filipinos live abroad and more than 1 million Filipino leave the country each year to work abroad. Remittances to the Philippines from around the world continue to grow, according to the International Labor Organization - Philippines.

Throughout human history, migration has been a courageous expression of the individual’s will to overcome adversity and to live a better life. Today, globalization, together with advances in communications and transportation, has greatly increased the number of people who have the desire and the capacity to move to other places.

This new era has created challenges and opportunities for societies throughout the world. It also has served to underscore the clear linkage between migration and development, as well as the opportunities it provides for co-development, that is, the concerted improvement of economic and social conditions at both the countries of origin and destination.
The US government recently endured a month-long partial shutdown due to a partisan dispute over funding to build a wall on the country’s southern border with Mexico. While those on both sides of the issue were digging in their heels, I got to thinking about migration trends in Asia.

According to the most recent edition of ADB's Asian Economic Integration Report, Asia remains the world’s largest continental source of international migrants. Indeed, one in three migrants worldwide comes from the region.

The number of Asian migrants has grown steadily to about 87 million, and the report notes that leading source countries of migrants to Asia are the People’s Republic of China (PRC) with 5.2 million, the Russian Federation (3.8 million), and Bangladesh (3.7 million), reports the World Economic Forum.

Primary drivers for the movement of such large numbers of people include conflict and the desire for better educational and economic opportunities. Another emerging driver of migration that has received more attention of late is climate change, the subject of a landmark ADB study.

The majority of Asian migrants are semi- and low-skilled workers such as maids, caregivers and manual laborers, including those working on construction sites. Skilled Asian migrants tend to move to advanced industrial economies outside the region.

Economist Mita Adhisti calculated that ASEAN’s overall economic growth could increase 7.1% by 2025 if member countries took steps to support migration, such as improving labor market information, providing language and skill training, simplifying administrative requirements, and expanding MRAs to semi-skilled workers.

Demographically-driven labor shortages in high-income economies are creating new opportunities for migrants from developing countries in the region.

Australia’s Pacific Labour Scheme kicked off in July 2018 to allow citizens of Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Vanuatu to take up low and semi-skilled work opportunities in rural and regional Australia for up to three years.

Beginning in 2019, Japan plans to begin issuing more than a quarter-million five-year visas for workers in 14 sectors that are experiencing serious labor shortages, including caregiving, construction, agriculture and shipbuilding. A separate new visa category for high-skilled workers will grant permission for long-term stays, and the right to bring families into the country.

Australia and Japan are not the only countries in the region that will require more workers.

The Economist has reported that countries in East Asia will have to import 275 million people between the ages of 15 and 64 by 2030 to keep the share of the population at working age steady. Malaysia, Viet Nam, Singapore, Thailand, and the PRC will need workers. Countries with a surplus of workers include Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Myanmar, and the Philippines.

In the US, a bill in Congress has been introduced to allow agricultural workers to have temporary visas to work on American farms facing labor shortages.

As these global movements of people occur, we can expect more racist backlashes against the migrants even though their labor is vital for the economies of the destination countries.

“At a crucial moment when migration policies are being reviewed in many regions and countries, it is vital that security concerns do not override the human rights of migrants,” say experts in global migration trends.

“On this International Migrants Day, I call on the international community to act on the global compact on safe, regular and orderly migration as an important contribution to building a world of peace, prosperity, dignity and opportunity for all,” said UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon

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