Madame Chairperson,

Distinguished Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen,

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) would like to
take the opportunity to recall the relevance for today's debate of
the impact of migration on poverty alleviation and development.

In 2006, more than 195 million migrants lived around the globe,
more than half of whom were women. It is now more widely
acknowledged that their migration may constitute a means of
promoting development in both areas of origin and areas of
destination based on the complementarities and an increasingly
shared economic and commercial space between them. Like the
Secretary General in his preparatory report for last year's UN
High-Level Dialogue on International Migration and Development
(HLD) (A/60/871), we believe that two of the issues that warrant
further discussion and action are (i) the poverty-alleviating
effects of remittances and (ii) the need to mainstream migration
into national Poverty Reduction Strategies (PRSPs). We are glad to
see that the latter has also been reflected in the report for this
discussion on "Women in development". Since the HLD, IOM has been
operationally engaged in giving concrete application to these key
issues by following up with a number of member States in developing
pilot projects to reflect international migration issues in their
national development strategies.

Also, the Global Forum on Migration and Development last July in
Brussels represented an additional vehicle to exchange know-how and
experiences about migration programmes and approaches.  With
other members of the inter-agency Global Migration Group, IOM has
been providing technical and institutional expertise to the Belgian
government.  We look forward to cooperating with the
Philippines, which has offered to host the next meeting of the
Global Forum.

Madame Chairperson,

A recent study by IFAD and the IDB reveals that migrants working
in industrialized countries sent home more than USD 300 billion to
their families in 2006. The question of the poverty-alleviating
effects of remittances has been subject to a number of field
studies, one of which  found - based on a strong sample of 71
developing countries - that the increase in international migration
and remittances did indeed produce a significant decrease of
poverty. IOM has been following up on this global research with
more in-depth country studies, which for example include research
on Migration and Poverty Alleviation in China, Swiss Remittances to
Serbia and most recently "Migration, Remittances, and Living
Standards in Tajikistan".

This research indicates that while remittances are first and
foremost private funds, they have indeed an important impact on the
financial well-being of many families and are keeping some of the
most vulnerable households out of poverty.  Remittances have
also been shown to offer development possibilities for entire
communities.

The Study on China, for instance, comes to the conclusion that
migration has played an increasingly important role in rural income
growth and poverty reduction. Labour market policy reforms have
gradually created a friendly institutional environment to encourage
and support rural-urban migration that is becoming more responsive
to income inequalities.

The most recent study IOM conducted in Tajikistan shows that
seasonal migration and remittances have become a strong structural
feature of the Tajik economy. Estimated at USD 550 million in 2004
and 735 million in 2005, remittances sent by Tajik migrants who
overwhelmingly work in Russia currently represent 31 per cent of
the country's Gross Domestic Product.  According to the
report, 86 per cent of money sent home by an overwhelming majority
of young migrants is used by the family in Tajikistan to meet basic
current consumption needs. Concretely the report finds, that 50 per
cent of the extremely poor households who have benefited since 1999
from remittances have now risen above the poverty line.

Madame Chairperson,

The need to understand the relationship between migration,
poverty and livelihoods is critically important, not least because
poverty reduction strategies and programmes can significantly
either promote or restrict mobility, which in turn can and will
have an impact on the eventual outcome of such policies and
programmes.  The purpose of including migration in PRSP's is
not to distract from debates about the desirability or otherwise of
migration, or to lament its impact on developing countries, but to
acknowledge that while migration often takes place in response to
poverty situations,  it can also have the impact of reducing
poverty, particularly at a household level. 

To conclude, Madame Chairperson, IOM in collaboration with UNDP,
the World Bank and UNICEF is currently working on a Handbook on
Integrating Migration in National Development Plans to look at this
problem holistically.  One of the challenges in developing a
migration and development strategy is that often migration lacks
comprehensive national migration policies and synergies to ensure
internal coherence.  Therefore, in preparation for the Global
Forum on Migration and Development in Manila in 2008, IOM, UNDP,
the World Bank and UNICEF will publish this Handbook with the
objective to assist in the development of a migration and
development strategy in a consultative manner with all key
stakeholders, including government, private sector and civil
society, in a way that fosters coordination and cooperation between
ministries, international partners and technical cooperation
providers.  More specifically, this exercise is meant to (1)
help increase awareness on the nexus between migration and
development; (2) assist governments in identifying the
interrelationship between migration and poverty; (3) assist in
coordinating government, international organization and donors
activities on this issue at the national and/or regional level; and
(4) provide a methodology for the design, implementation and
monitoring of a plan of action on Migration and Development
consistent with national and regional development strategies.

We look forward to sharing what we hope will be an innovative
tool on the importance of integrating migration in national
development agendas.

Thank you.