IOM, Ministry of Labour, Present Study on Labour Migration Flows to Costa Rica
A multi-agency report on regional labour migration released today
in the Costa Rican capital San Jose at a migration management
workshop confirms that Costa Rica is a key destination for migrant
labour in Central America, especially from Nicaragua and Panama.
Migrants account for about 8.2 per cent (374,100 people) of
Costa Rica's total population and some 75 per cent of them come
from Nicaragua. In 2008, Nicaraguans accounted for 67 per cent of
the estimated 197,500 migrants in the country's labour force,
according to the study, which was conducted by IOM, the Costa Rican
Ministry of Labour and Social Security, the ILO and the Central
America Integration System.
The report, which included in depth interviews with 300 labour
migrants, notes that over a third of labour migrants in Costa Rica
are employed in construction and the hospitality industry. The rest
are employed in agriculture, manufacturing and commerce. Some 70
per cent are men.
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target="_blank" title="">Flujos migratorios intrarregionales:
situación actual, retos y oportunidades en
Centroamérica y República Dominicana
An estimated 65 per cent of construction workers are migrants
from Nicaragua and 50 per cent of the estimated 76,000 people
employed each year to harvest coffee are either Nicaraguan or from
the Ngäbe Buglé indigenous community of Panama.
Some 83 per cent of women interviewed worked as domestic workers
and 17 per cent were employed in agriculture.
Fifty-six per cent of migrants interviewed said close family
members depend on the remittances that they send home. In 2008, an
estimated 229,190 migrants in Costa Rica sent home more than USD
257 million in remittances.
That same year, 184,900 Costa Rican migrants sent home more than
USD 624 million in remittances. By way of comparison, banana
exports amounted to USD 689.7 million and coffee exports earned USD
305 million.
The San Jose workshop, which ends today, brought together 50
participants from government institutions, the private sector,
civil society and academia, to discuss ways to improve and
modernize labour migration management strategies and to raise
awareness of the importance of rights-based labour migration
management, with a focus on south-south migration flows.
It was organized by IOM, in cooperation with the Ministry of
Labor and Social Security, the General Directorate for Migration,
and the Ministry of External Relations, as part of IOM's regional
project Improving Labour Migration Administration in Central
America and the Dominican Republic funded by the Government of
Canada.
"The study and workshop, which are carried out in close
cooperation with government entities and other partners, are tools
for the governments to identify labour migration realities and
needs in order to develop the policies and strategies for
well-managed migration," explains Luis Carlos Esquivel, IOM Chief
of Mission in Costa Rica.
A copy of the study, available in Spanish, can be downloaded
from:
"/jahia/webdav/shared/shared/mainsite/media/docs/reports/Informe-Costa-Rica-Flujos-Migratorios-Laborales-Intrarregionales.pdf"
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For more information, please contact:
Sofía Salas
IOM Costa Rica
Tel: + 506.2221.5348, Ext. 243
E-mail:
"mailto:ssalas@iom.int">ssalas@iom.int