Santo Domingo – The results of the Migration Governance Indicators (MGI) in the Dominican Republic reveal advances in the legal and institutional capacity of the Dominican Government to guarantee the socioeconomic well-being of migrants. The MGI was implemented with the engagement of 22 public agencies, under the coordination of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MIREX) and the technical support of IOM, the UN Migration Agency.

According to the MGI results, the Dominican Republic scored above seven points out of ten, in the application of its migration policies. Also, the MGI provides evidence of significant progress in the governance of migration policies with a comprehensive approach towards safe and orderly migration.

The results of the MGI will serve as inputs for the National Action Plan of the Technical Committee on Migration (CTIAM in Spanish). The CTIAM is an inter-agency board created to coordinate the processes related to migration under the framework of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and the lines of action established in the country's National Development Strategy (NDT).

"Today, the Dominican Republic promotes its leadership in the Caribbean, Central America, and the entire continent by presenting the Migration Governance Indicators, a statistical instrument that allows us to evaluate, identify and bring out specific aspects of areas to be improved and strengthened," said Miguel Vargas, Foreign Affairs Minister, in the launch event of the MGI and the Action Plan of the CTIAM.

IOM's Head of Mission in the Dominican Republic, Jorge Baca, stated that: "IOM applauds the Dominican Government's willingness to apply the Indicators, as well as the creation of the inter-agency Technical Committee on Migration. Migration is not a problem that needs to be solved, but a reality that needs to be managed."

Some of the benefits of the MGI for the Dominican Republic include 1) providing the country with a framework of reference on how to add value to human mobility processes through cohesive and coherent policies; 2) obtaining an assessment of the country's migration situation that allows obtaining the means to identify and classify areas for improvement; and 3) having a statistical instrument to measure the progress and reach of goals related to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) affected, directly or indirectly, by migration.

The MGI is a methodology for monitoring migration policies designed by the Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU) of The Economist, at the request of IOM. The objective of the MGI is to provide a consolidated framework for evaluating specific migration governance structures of each country and act as a source of information in the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals related to migration.

The implementation of the MGI in the Dominican Republic was funded by the IOM Development Fund, aimed at supporting developing IOM’s member states in their efforts to strengthen their migration management capacity.

For more information please contact Alicia Sangro at IOM Dominican Republic, Tel: + (809) 688-8174, Email: asangro@iom.int