Berlin – 22 September 2020, IOM’s Global Migration Data Analysis Centre released the newly edited volume “Migration in West and North Africa And Across the Mediterranean: Trends, Risks, Development, Governance”. This publication is the result of a highly collaborative effort involving several IOM offices and organizations participating in the programme: Safety, Support and Solutions II (SSSII) funded by the United Kingdom Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) as well as other international, non-governmental and civil society organizations, and research institutions.

Timely, reliable, disaggregated data and contextual information related to people on the move are imperative for well-informed, well-managed and humane policymaking on migration. A nuanced understanding of migration realities is especially important in contexts such as North and West Africa and the Central Mediterranean, where migration movements result from a combination of different and complex factors.

This volume, divided in four sections, dedicated to migration trends risks, development, and governance, focuses on West and North Africa, and mostly covers the period 2018–2019. Its four sections deal with four of the most salient features of migration along the Central Mediterranean Route: recent trends and data issues, development implications, risks and vulnerabilities, as well as national, regional and cross-regional governance elements. The report provides a comprehensive, fact-based account of migration from and within West and North Africa and across the Mediterranean, with the aim of promoting more coherent, forward-looking and sustainable policy approaches, in line with the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM). 

There are eight main take-aways from this volume:

1. Recognize migrants’ agency: migrants from West and North Africa adopt flexible mobility-based strategies to contribute to their own and their communities’ resilience and development.
2. Address inequalities in migration: Migrants adapt their mobility-based strategies to changing policies, labour market opportunities, border controls and risks.
3. Understand linkages between migrants’ profiles and circumstances, and exposure to risks and their ability to cope with them.
4. Ensure the basic rights of migrants irrespective of their legal status.
5. Recognize the complexity of migrant smuggling.
6. Deconstruct misconceptions and fears about African migration.
7. Support policies informed by evidence and monitor their impact.
8. Produce and analyze administrative data to inform opinions and governments.

This publication is released at a time of great uncertainty regarding migration and changing socioeconomic dynamics around the world, especially during the ongoing global health crisis COVID-19, which further exacerbates pre-existing vulnerabilities. However, this volume is anticipated to improve evidence on migration in these regions, and its use for programming and policy in the wider context of migration governance. 

Click here to access the full report.

For more information, please contact Wigdan Mohamad at IOM Egypt, Tel: +20 1012 428 527, Email: wimohamad@iom.int