Migration in West Africa– Governance and Links to Labour MarketsOECD and UNDP – Dakar

25 March 2010

Lead into the Workshop: The Governance of Migration

Abla SafirPoverty Reduction and Social Development Unit

OECD Development Centre

Outline

• Presentation of the Effective Partnerships Project• Governance of Migration: Definition and Issues• The Different Levels of the Governance of Migration• Problematic Evaluation of Specific Policies

The Effective Partnerships Project

• A project on migration funded by the MacArthur Foundation

• Thematic and regional focus– Themes: Governance and Links to Labour Markets– Regions: Central America and West Africa

• Particular interest in topics seldom covered– Impact of emigration on sending countries’ labour markets– South-South migration

The Governance of Migration

• Governance of Migration : how formal and informal rules are created, managed and enforced, setting constraints and incentives on migration and migration-induced flows

• Governance at all levels: from global to national

Global Governance of Migration

• WMO difficult to set in theory

• Governments, in particular in receiving countries, very reluctant to holding multilateral negotiations on migration

• Consensus on some issues

Regional Governance of Migration

• The natural institutions to manage migration? – Regional and extra-regional migration?

• In the regions we study:– Central America: Regional Conference on Migration– West Africa: a lot of ambition but little success in managing

intra-regional migration (OECD 2009)

Is South-South Migration Better Managed than South-North Migration?

• South country in better position to negotiate with another South country?– Cultural / identity issues easier to solve?– But workers more likely to be substitutes than in the case of South-

North migration? • Historically, examples of bad governance of South-South

migration

Bilateral Agreements - South-North Migration

• The favourite tool of receiving countries

• Seemingly little bargaining power of sending countries

Impact of Migration Policies: What do we know?

• Lack of information on the impact of specific policies– Lack of data – Lack of ex-ante designs to allow for impact evaluation of

policies• The little we know:

– Restrictive policies seem to decrease immigration– In Central America: NAFTA and more border controls have limited

impact– Permanent migration programme from Tonga to New Zealand

An example: temporary and circular migration

• Much ado with no information?

• An exception: McKenzie and Gibson (2008) examine the poverty impact of a seasonal migration program for low-skilled in New Zealand

www.oecd.org/dev/migration

25 March 2010

Migration in West Africa– Governance and Links to Labour MarketsOECD and UNDP – Dakar

We look forward to an informative

workshop!