EU legislation, proposed by the European Commission and approved by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, dictates which data Member States are required to submit to various EU institutions. Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 sets out EU rules for collecting and compiling statistics on migration (emigration and immigration), international protection (asylum), regular and irregular migration and returns by EU and EFTA countries (European Parliament and Council of the European Union, 2007). The legislation also describes the required data breakdowns, the frequency and timeline of data submissions and accepted methodological guidelines for data collection or elaboration. The EU institutions carry out quality checks, consolidation and dissemination of the data. For example, Regulation No. 862/2007 recommends that all data on immigrants (stocks and flows), emigrants (stocks and flows), return migrants or asylum seekers always be disaggregated by country of birth, country of citizenship, age, sex, country of previous usual residence (for immigrants) and country of next usual residence (for emigrants).
How can regional inter-governmental collaboration foster migration data capacity-building?
The United Nations Economic Commission for Latin American (ECLAC) initiated a joint project with UNDESA aimed at strengthening national capacities to collect internationally comparable migration data and improving government stakeholders’ understanding of the use and limitations of migration data to inform migration policy-making. In 2022, several participating countries undertook an evaluation of national capacities to produce migration data, the results of which revealed that while most countries collect relevant data from population censuses, household surveys, specialized surveys and administrative registers, there are disparities between countries in terms of access to data and capacity-building. The project culminated in a roadmap to improve migration data outlining several steps:
-establish coordination mechanisms involving multiple stakeholders within each country
-develop and implement a basic framework for data production
-develop standardized migration modules for each subject area
-include additional topics such as labour mobility, discrimination, human rights
-explore the potential for non-traditional data sources to supplement traditional ones
-harmonize indicators for monitoring national policies in line with international standards
-enhance communication between data providers and users to better inform policymaking
-secure access to open data while respecting data protection and privacy standards
The African Union Institute for Statics (STATAFRIC) was established in 2013 and is mandated to lead in the provision and promotion of harmonized quality statistical information, including on migration. One of the 18 Specialized Technical Groups (STG) of STATAFRIC focuses on migration statistics and brings together experts from 18 AU member states. In 2018, the AU created the African Migration Observatory, which aims at facilitating the implementation of the Global Compact for Migration through data collection. In 2021, the AU, in collaboration with international partners, launched the Africa Migration Data Network (AfMDN) to strengthen coordination and knowledge sharing on migration data and is also tasked with mobilizing financial resources for conducting specialized migration surveys (African Union, 2021). Under the AU–ILO–IOM–UNECA Joint Program on Labour Migration Governance for Development and Integration in Africa (or JLMP), the AU and its partners produced several editions of the Report on Labour Migration Statistics in Africa, the most recent of which was published in 2019 (African Union, 2019). Various capacity-building programmes, training activities and workshops were organized to support the preparation of this report. Focal persons from AU Member States were trained in the collection and analysis of labour migration data, which enabled them to provide the necessary data for the report. The NSOs tasked with producing official statistics in African countries received the International Labour Migration Questionnaire and 47 countries eventually submitted data. However, with the assistance of experts, data were collated for a total of 54 countries by using reliable methodologies and secondary data sources to fill the gaps wherever this was feasible. For example, an online African School on Migration Statistics focusing on estimation methods was organized to support the development of The Report on Labour Migration in June 2021 (IOM, 2022).
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is an inter-governmental Organization comprised of 16 member states. The organization has taken several measures encouraging the harmonization and sharing of migration data in the region. In November 2000, the Migration Data Harmonization Project (MDHP) was initiated, at the request of participants in the Migration Dialogue for Southern Africa (MIDSA) process. The MDHP proposed two projects, the first of which was a comparative analysis of the immigration policies and legislation of SADC member states. The second project was a comparative analysis of migration data collection, processing and analysis practices across all members states (William and Tsang, 2007). The objectives of the analysis were to:
- describe the data collection systems used in each country;
- provide an overview of data processing and analysis in each country;
- investigate the availability and accessibility of migration data;
- provide an assessment of data quality;
- draft recommendations for the improvement of data collection systems;
- suggest solutions for harmonizing data collection systems across countries.
The comparative analysis revealed that there is quite some consistency between the data collection systems of SADC member states and that harmonization would be a feasible. What is lacking, however, is a joint statement of the purpose and the extent of harmonization (William and Tsang, 2007). In addition to the MDHP, SADC’s statistical yearbook compiles migration data for the region, for example, by providing statistics of migrant remittance outflows and remittances as a share of the GDP for each country (SADC, 2022).
As part of ILO’s ASEAN Triangle project, the Association of Southeast Asian States (ASEAN) developed an International Labour Migration Statistics Database (ILO, 2023). The data include countries' stocks of international migrants and international migrant workers; the corresponding annual inflows of these; and countries' stocks and outflows of nationals abroad. The project developed guidelines for the process of developing such a database which may serve as a reference for future regional migration data collection processes (ILO, 2015). The process is structured into several stages:
- designing an international labour migration questionnaire based on consultations with stakeholders and data users on their particular interests and data needs;
- conducting a desk review of the relevant official primary sources publicly available in each of the countries covered;
- identifying national focal specialists (including one representative from the NSO and one from the government agency responsible for migration) to participate in a technical meeting to finalize the international labour migration questionnaire and launch the data collection;
- collecting the data for the international labour migration questionnaire, which was then reviewed by clarifying any missing sources, unclear definitions, or possible inconsistences and by seeking out additional data sources;
- presenting the results of the first round of data collection at a second technical meeting and launching a second round of data collection on the basis of the recommendations provided;
- cleaning and recoding the data in order to develop relevant indicators for a preliminary analysis and compiling the data onto one excel spreadsheet for publication.
Many low-income countries have a limited data infrastructure and therefore rely on other countries’ facilities to exchange, store and process data (World Bank, 2021). This reliance requires them to transfer large volumes of data in and out of the country, meaning they pay steeper prices for data exchange, storage and processing than countries with their own data infrastructure. Regional collaboration can play a bridging role in the development of data infrastructure, such as through the establishment of internet exchange points and colocation data centres. Colocation data centres are large data centre facilities that rent out space to third parties, such as government agencies, multinationals or telecommunications companies that lack their own servers or network equipment. Countries with well-developed international gateways and competitive information and communication technology sectors can aggregate regional demand to support shared facilities (World Bank, 2021). Africa Data Centres (part of the Liquid Telecom Group) has colocation facilities in Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa, and Zimbabwe.