Global migration in raw numbers is booming with the highest numbers of people ever moving from their home countries to others, according a new mapping exercise on global human movement.

But despite the narratives being peddled by a rising of nationalist and protectionist political movements, as a share of the world population, international migration has remained fairly constant over the past decades at around 3 per cent.

In 2016, the number of international migrants worldwide – people residing in a country other than their country of birth – was the highest ever recorded, having reached 244 million – up from 232 million in 2013, according to the mapping by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) .

While female migrants constitute only 48 per cent of the international migrant stock worldwide, and 42 per cent in Asia, women make up the majority of international migrants in Europe (52.4 per cent) and North America (51.2 per cent).

South-South migration flows (between developing countries) continued to grow compared to South-North movements (from developing to developed countries).

In 2016, 90.2 million international migrants born in developing countries resided in other countries in the Global South, while 85.3 million born in the South resided in countries in the Global North.

Germany became the second most popular destination for international migrants globally in absolute numbers, following the United States and preceding the Russian Federation, with an estimated 12 million foreign-born residing in the country – compared to 46.6 million in the U.S. and 11.9 million in the Russian Federation.

As a proportion of the host country’s population, however, numbers of international migrants continue to be highest in Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

The foreign-born population makes up 88.4% of the total population in the United Arab Emirates, 75.7 per cent in Qatar and 73.6 per cent in Kuwait.

Close to 1 in 5 migrants in the world live in the top 20 largest cities, according to IOM’s World Migration Report.

International migrants make up over a third of the total population in cities like Sydney, Auckland, Singapore and London, and at least one in four residents in Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Paris is foreign-born.

Recently we have seen the highest levels of forced displacement recorded globally since WWII, with a dramatic increase in the number of refugees, asylum-seekers and internally displaced people across various regions of the world

The world now hosts more than 16 million refugees – and increase of almost 50 per cent compared to four years ago, largely due to continued conflict in Syria – now into its sixth year.

The vast majority of refugees continue to be hosted by developing countries, particularly those that are proximate to the refugees’ countries of origin: for instance, the bulk of the Syrian refugee population is hosted by Turkey (2.2 million), Lebanon (1.2 million) and Jordan (almost 630,000), according to figures recorded in December 2015.

Also, most forced displacement globally still occurs within countries’ borders, with an estimated 38 million people internally displaced by conflict and violence at the end of 2014 – from Iraq to South Sudan, from Syria to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria.

New estimates for the number of migrant workers globally show that the large majority of international migrants in the world are migrant workers. Migrants have higher labour force participation than non-migrants, the data shows.

Remittances continue to climb globally while remittance-sending costs remain relatively high.

The sum of financial remittances sent by international migrants back to their families in origin countries amounted to almost $US600 in 2015 – over three-quarters of which were sent to low and middle income economies.

Laurie Nowell
AMES Australia Senior Journalist