IOM Migration Profile for Brazil Provides Comprehensive Overview
An IOM Migration Profile for Brazil provides a comprehensive
overview of migration of the largest and most populous country in
South America and the world’s eighth largest economy.
The IOM Migration Profile examines how massive forced and
voluntary immigration during the colonial period mainly from
Portugal, Japan, Italy and Germany shaped the South American nation
which since the 1980s has seen millions of its citizens migrating
overseas.
Publication
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target="_blank" title="">Perfil Migratório do Brasil
2009
It is estimated that between one and three million Brazilians
are currently living outside the country, or less than two per cent
of the population. The main destination countries are the United
States, Japan, Paraguay and Portugal.
Remittances sent home by Brazilian migrants in 2008 amounted to
some USD 2.9 billion, making Brazil the second largest recipient of
migrant remittances in the Western Hemisphere after Mexico.
However, remittances in Brazil represent only one per cent of the
Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Migration issues have reached a prominent place on the
government’s agenda following a growing official perception
that the country has joined the large human flows that characterize
globalization. There is also the recognition that it requires
institutional restructuring and that there is a need for the
capacities of existing bodies dealing with migration in Brazil to
be enhanced.
The creation of the Under-secretariat for Brazilian Communities
Abroad, within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has spurred the
development of relevant actions both through consulates and through
specific programmes. The National Immigration Council, established
in 2004 within the Ministry of Labor, is in charge of policy
definition and gathers governmental institutions and
representatives of employers, unions, civil society and
academia.
Migration flows into the country have greatly decreased, with
the current immigrant population estimated at around 150,000
persons. But some 87,000 of these are Brazilians returning from
abroad, particularly from Japan. In the last decade, immigration
from Bolivia has considerably increased.
The IOM Profile of Brazil also includes the growth of
transnational migration; the spread of social networks linked to
migration; the increase of activities linked to remittances; the
increasing role of women in migration flows; the creation of
migrant associations; migrant smuggling human trafficking; forced
migration; seasonal migration; migration of the highly skilled and
bilateral and multilateral migration policies.
IOM Migration Profiles, prepared in close cooperation with
government entities working on migration-related issues, are
developed as a tool for governments to identify and understand
their migration realities and needs in order to develop the
policies and strategies at the national and regional levels for
well-managed migration.
In South America, IOM has also developed Migration Profiles for
Argentina, Colombia and Ecuador, and has begun work on profiles for
Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela.
The migration profile for Brazil is available in Portuguese at
the IOM online bookstore:
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For more information contact:
Mariana Bocca
IOM Buenos Aires
Tel: + 54 1 14 815 51 94
E-mail:
"mailto:mbocca@iom.int">mbocca@iom.int