Morocco - As part of the national consultations on the UN post-2015 development agenda (www.worldwewant2015.org/), IOM and UNDP Morocco will tomorrow (13/3/13) organize a special session to allow the diaspora to contribute to the process.

The event will include ministries, Moroccans residing abroad, those who have just returned, diaspora associations and researchers, as well as members of the UN Country Team.

An online discussion took place ahead of the meeting on www.maghribcom.gov.ma, a web platform launched in 2013 by the Ministry of Moroccans Residing Abroad, to encourage the broadest possible participation by Moroccan expatriates.

The five million Moroccans residing outside the Kingdom play an important role in the development of the country, not least in terms of the remittances that they send home. In 2011, Moroccans abroad sent home over USD 6.5 billion – the equivalent of USD 220 for each of Morocco’s 30 million-strong population. Morocco ranked third in Africa in terms of remittance receipts per capita.

Migration was not referenced in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were established in 2000, and will be replaced by the post-2015 development agenda. But it does impact on several of the goals, most notably poverty eradication.

“Tomorrow’s discussion will contribute to ensuring that migrants' voices are heard in this preparatory debate and that, this time around, migration will be factored into the future UN development agenda,” says  IOM Morocco Chief of Mission Anke Strauss.

For more information please contact

Christos Christodoulides
IOM Rabat
Email: cchristodoulides@iom.int