A migration profile for Ecuador published by IOM today, points to
poverty and lack of jobs as the main reasons for massive migration
from Ecuador over the past decade.  The Central Bank of
Ecuador estimates that some two million Ecuadorians are currently
living abroad.

Increased controls in the United States after 11 September 2001
led Ecuadorians to look for new destinations.  Between 2000
and 2008 more than one million Ecuadorians migrated to Europe,
mainly to Spain and Italy.  According to Spanish government
figures, the number of migrants form Ecuador rose from 3,972 in
1998 to 390,297 in 2003 – a 1,000 per cent increase in five
years.

Historically, there have been two main mass migratory outflows
from Ecuador.  The first took place in the 1950s from Azuay
and Cañar provinces as a result of a crisis in the export of
"Panama Hats" which was the principal economic activity for the
region. The vast majority of these migrants headed for the United
States.  The second massive migratory wave was attributed to
several causes, but the most important was the financial crisis
that began in the mid-1990s.

The profile reports that remittances sent by Ecuadorian
migrants, vital to the daily subsistence of families left behind,
decreased by 13.3 per cent to USD 706 million in the third quarter
of 2008 in comparison to the USD 814 million received during the
same period in 2007.

The new IOM report also points to Ecuador as a destination
country for migrants, mainly from other Latin American countries
– primarily Colombia and Peru.  Colombians cross into
Ecuador in search of international protection fleeing the violence
in their country. According to data from the UN High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR), Ecuador has the highest number of refugees of
any country in Latin America with an estimated 250,000 Colombians
having crossed into Ecuador in the past decade alone.

Peruvians from the northern part of the country migrate to
Ecuador to find jobs which are paid in US dollars, the legal tender
in Ecuador. 

To deal with the migration realities facing the country, the
Ecuadorian government created the National Secretariat for
Migration.  The new office is focused on raising awareness and
promoting the protection of migrants and asylum seekers, mitigating
the loss of young and skilled workers, creating programmes to
increase the impact of remittances on local development, and on
diminishing the negative effects of family separation. 

"IOM's migration profiles on individual countries provide
reliable and comparable migration data to strengthen the ability of
national migration authorities in the region to effectively manage
migration flows," says Frank Laczko, IOM's Head of Research and
Publications. "The overall objective of the profiles is to
contribute towards greater coherence of national migration policies
and to promote regional cooperation."

The project was funded through IOM's 1035 facility which
provides special support to IOM Developing Member States and Member
States with Economy in Transition to develop and implement joint
IOM-government projects addressing migration management issues.
Since its inception in 2001, the Facility has supported more than
200 projects in 85 countries.

The IOM Migration Profile for Ecuador is available in Spanish at
the IOM website:  "http://publications.iom.int/bookstore/">http://publications.iom.int/bookstore/

For more information, please contact:

Ana Guzman

IOM Ecuador

Tel:  + (593-2) 225-3948

E-mail: "mailto:aguzman@iom.int">aguzman@iom.int