ILO organizes regional technical meeting on statistics of international labour migration and migrant recruitment costs in South Asia

Kathmandu, 30 November: The GOALS programme (Governance of Labour Migration in South and South-East Asia) organized a regional technical meeting on ‘Statistics of international labour migration and migrant recruitment costs in South Asia’ in Kathmandu from 28 – 30 November 2023.

In South Asia and across the world, the effective governance of labour migration has emerged as a policy priority with weighty political, economic and social implications. Migration trends continue to evolve over time, and the challenges appear to have increased in complexity. New approaches that are evidence-based are needed to ensure the advancement of a fair migration agenda and a fair sharing of the prosperity labour migration can create, with policies that respond equitably to the interests of countries of origin and destination, to employers, and for all workers – nationals and migrants. This priority has been reiterated in national and regional discussions and at the global level through SDG’s and the Global Compact for Migration.

To address some of these issues/challenges and identify potential measures – ILO organised the regional meeting in Kathmandu with statisticians and analysts from national statistical offices, policymakers from relevant ministries on labour migration, workers and employers’ organizations, and representatives from CSOs and academia from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The overall objective of the high-level meeting was to promote a dialogue on data gaps and priorities and to improve statistics on international labour migration to support evidence-based policymaking.

At the opening session of the regional meeting, ILO Country Director for Nepal – Mr Numan Ozcan, stressed that “Harnessing the potential of labour migration towards development gains requires well-informed, coherent and effective policymaking, based on up-to-date and reliable data.” He also highlighted that the regional meeting provides an important opportunity to exchange good practices and share knowledge of emerging methods and standards to address the many challenges of data collection and analysis in the area of labour migration.

Participants emphasized the need for further collaboration at the national level between the producers and users of statistics and establish national coordination mechanisms on labour migration statistics with representatives from government and non-government actors. Participants also identified the need to include migration-related indicators in periodical surveys including census and labour force surveys.

The high-level meeting was attended by over 35 participants from South Asia along with experts and resource persons from ILO’s statistics and migration team from Geneva, Bangkok, Delhi and from IOM and UN Women. The meeting was coordinated and organised in partnership with ILO’s International Training Centre (ITCILO).

The meeting concluded with the development of action plans to better measure, analyse and disseminate labour migration data at the national levels in South Asia.