Year: 2018

Data, Humanitarian, Migration, Policy

Let’s be transparent about refugee and IDP statistics

By Justin Schon, Postdoctoral Associate, University of Florida

refugeesIn March 2018, the Expert Group on Refugee and Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) Statistics (ERGIS) released detailed reports on the status of refugee and IDP statistics and challenges in compiling these statistics. The reports made many valuable recommendations for how to increase the quality and quantity of migration data, but several recent developments highlight the need to also be more transparent about the types of uncertainty that exist in our measurements.

Uganda announced in October that a recent census had revealed that it currently hosts 1.1 million refugees, not 1.4 million as had previously been believed. IOM data on displacement from Mosul in Iraq during the 2016-2017 military offensive to retake the city from ISIS forces show a sudden jump in the estimate of IDPs due to a counting adjustment. Fabrice Balanche notes that UNOCHA decreased its estimate of Syrian IDPs from 7.5 million to 6.5 million during the fall of 2015, simply due to blatant overestimates that it knew were being provided.

Uncertain estimates even exist in refugee camps, where there are large numbers of humanitarian personnel. Officials in Jordan’s Zaatari refugee camp have significantly revised its estimated population multiple times after new counts. For example, the REACH initiative conducted a camp census from December 30, 2014 through January 18, 2015, and counted 7 954 fewer people in the camp than during the June 2014 count. On July 10, 2018, UNHCR deactivated nearly 11 000 camp registrations due either because they were absent from the camp, they were bailed out, they had registered elsewhere in an urban location, or they had returned to their country of origin. Continue reading “Let’s be transparent about refugee and IDP statistics”

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Africa, Migration

What’s behind West African migration? Findings from nationwide surveys

By Matthew Kirwin, United States Department of State and National Intelligence University 2017-18 Research Fellow and Jessica Anderson, Institute for the Study of International Migration, Georgetown University

Gambian migrants deported from Libya stand in line as they wait for registration at the airport in Banjul
© Luc Gnago/Reuters

The movement of sub-Saharan Africans through North Africa and on to Europe persists in the media spotlight. Over 700 000 African migrants have arrived in Italy through the perilous Central Mediterranean Route since 20141, and nearly 190 000 arrived in 2017 alone according to the International Organization of Migration (IOM). While 2018 numbers for this route are slightly lower2, Africans are now testing their luck with both the Central Mediterranean Route and a new path, seeking to reach Europe via Morocco and Spain. In the first half of 2018, the number of migrants entering through Spain has risen dramatically.3 Continue reading “What’s behind West African migration? Findings from nationwide surveys”

Lia Beyeler
Africa, Policy

Understanding South-South migration

By Jason Gagnon, Development economist, OECD Development Centre

Migration is the talk of the moment. Last week, experts debated migration’s place in today’s global context during the 11th Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) Summit and the Intergovernmental Conference on the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM). The outcome: 163 member countries of the United Nations pledged their support for a ground breaking document establishing migration – and migrants – as a vehicle for good.

Amongst the many debates, much talk was on South-South migration (SSM) and on the future particularly of Africa in this regard. But why this focus? Most studies on SSM fail to clarify what is different about SSM and why we should pay attention to it. Arguments are good for why SSM may be similar or different to what we’ve come to expect from previously studied migration corridors. But there are also many misconceptions on SSM – particularly in Africa. So what do we know?

Most of this misconceived perception lies in how we measure stocks, which currently tells us that more migrants born in the South live elsewhere in the South (than in the North): 53% to be exact in Africa. And the numbers are indeed much higher when we dig more locally: 71% in sub-Saharan Africa. Dig down deeper and the rate increases even more: up to 79% in Middle Africa.

Continue reading “Understanding South-South migration”
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Development in Transition, Policy, Reviving multilateralism

What’s the path to sustainable development?

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By Mario Pezzini, former Director, OECD Development Centre, and Special Advisor to the OECD Secretary-General on Development

This blog is part of an ongoing series evaluating
various facets of Development in Transition.
Perspectives on Global Development 2019: Rethinking Development Strategies
adds to this discussion

Cover-PGD_2019What’s the path to sustainable development? In this era of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) — when all countries face both new challenges and new opportunities for improving the lives of their citizens in inclusive, holistic and environmentally sustainable ways – the question remains as relevant as ever.

Some may think the question was answered in the 2000s when we witnessed the transformation of the global economic geography. Whereas only 12 developing countries in the 1990s managed to double the OECD per-capita growth rates, 83 developing countries managed to do so a decade later. By 2008, developing and emerging economies made up 50% of the global economy for the first time. And the 15-fold surge in South-South trade linkages from 1990 to 2016 and the jump in development finance from USD 3.2 billion in 2003 go USD 15.6 billion in 2012 provided by large emerging economies, notably China, are clear proof points of this new economic geography.

Yet, this upswing in global economic growth masks two underlying issues that we cannot ignore on the road to sustainable development.

Continue reading “What’s the path to sustainable development?”

Development Matters
Gender, Women and Girls

Gender equity starts at the dinner table

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By David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme

This blog is part of a special series marking the launch of the updated
2019 Social Institutions and Gender Index (SIGI)

Adolescent girls are the most at risk of not being able to access a nutritious diet. Ensuring they do is key to economic development, peace and stability.

Imagine a family sitting down for a meal – a father, a mother who’s nursing a little baby, a school-aged boy and an adolescent girl. Who has the most on their dinner plate? Maybe Dad, since he’s the biggest and has a physically demanding job. Then the boy – I had two of them and sometimes it was amazing how much they could eat. Then after that, the two slimmest: Mom and daughter, right?

But this so-called cultural norm is exactly the opposite of what ought to happen, and that’s why a new focus on the nutrition needs of adolescent girls could make a big impact on the future of so many developing nations around the world.

Adolescent girls, even more than boys, require the most nutritious diet possible, loaded with fresh fruits and vegetables, along with meat, fish and dairy to give them the key vitamins and minerals that help them to grow. Unfortunately, in far too many areas, the needs of adolescent girls are rarely prioritised.

Continue reading “Gender equity starts at the dinner table”
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Gender, Women and Girls

It’s (literally) about time: men as part of the solution to closing the care gap

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By Ruti Levtov, PhD, Director of Research, Evaluation, and Learning at Promundo-US

This blog is part of a special series marking the launch of the updated
2019 Social Institutions and Gender Index (SIGI)

Two hundred and ten years: That’s how long it will take to close the gender gap in time spent on care if we continue on our current trajectory, according to recent analysis by the International Labour Organization (ILO). In no country in the world do men and women spend an equal amount of time on care responsibilities, an inequality that restricts women’s participation and growth in the labour force, in political leadership and in other public spheres. It also limits the space for men to express their full humanity as nurturers, caregivers and equal partners at home. To achieve global development goals, to fulfill human rights and to enable all of us to live full lives, we need to urgently address this inequality.

It won’t be an easy road – the barriers are many to recognising, reducing and – as is the focus of this blog – redistributing care. While redistributing unpaid care responsibilities between individuals and the state is essential, we know that gender stereotypes held by individuals, communities, workplaces and governments continue to presume that women’s most important contributions are at home, and men’s are in the workplace. At Promundo, we are focusing on how we can deconstruct these stereotypes. Continue reading “It’s (literally) about time: men as part of the solution to closing the care gap”

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Policy

Can we leave no one behind in a world so unequal?

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By Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director, Oxfam International

To read more about this topic, check out the upcoming release
of the Development Co-operation Report 2018: Joining Forces to Leave No One Behind on 11 December 2018

Winnie
The author, Winnie Byanyima, embraces a member of a women’s group within the POC (Protection of Civilian site) in Malakal, South Sudan. Photo: Bruno Bierrenbach Feder / Oxfam

To say that the world’s poorest people are simply being left behind can sound like an unbearably polite understatement at times, designed not to offend the rich and the powerful.

I think of the girls I grew up with in Uganda who have worked hard all their life, paid their taxes and supported their communities, only to see themselves and their children remain poor, without essential services. I think of women in poverty like Dolores, who works in a chicken factory in the United States. She and her co-workers wear diapers because their employer denies them toilet breaks (Oxfam, 20161).

These women aren’t just left behind but trapped and exploited at the bottom of a global economy.
Continue reading “Can we leave no one behind in a world so unequal?”

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Policy

Technological change raises the stakes for action to leave no one behind

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By Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator

To read more about this topic, check out the upcoming release
of the Development Co-operation Report 2018: Joining Forces to Leave No One Behind on 11 December 2018

growth-technology-people.jpgThe 2030 Agenda presents a historic opportunity to set the world on track to a sustainable future. In twelve years’ time, a litmus test for its success will be: have we made good on the promise to ‘leave no one behind’? The answer will depend, in some measure, on our responses to the fourth industrial revolution.

The speed and ubiquity of technological change offers unparalleled opportunities for sustainable development, but it also comes with the risk of rising inequalities within and between countries. It is up to policy makers to leverage this transformation for good, and to mitigate their risks.

Artificial intelligence can improve the quality and reach of health care with half of the world’s population still not having access to essential health services. Digital technologies can boost agricultural productivity. Satellite imagery can help combat deforestation. Big data analytics can identify needs and help track progress in real time. Drones can deliver essential supplies. And digital finance can enable new models to deliver basic services. Continue reading “Technological change raises the stakes for action to leave no one behind”

Development Matters
Gender, Women and Girls

Measuring beyond outcomes: Understanding gender inequality

By Papa A. Seck (@PABSeck), Chief Statistician, UN Women

Over her lifetime, a girl born today in Germany is expected to earn just about half the income of a boy born on the same day. In France and Sweden, she fares slightly better at about 70%. In Turkey, she can expect to earn no more than a quarter.1 Globally, it is estimated that 35% of women have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or sexual violence by a non-partner at some point in their lives. This is the most egregious violation of women’s rights and it is pervasive in all countries around the world, developed and developing alike. Such violence has often tragic consequences. A recent study by UNODC found that a shocking six women are killed every hour by a family member.2 An estimated 650 million women and girls in the world today were married before age 18, and at least 200 million women and girls alive today have undergone female genital mutilation in the 30 countries with representative data on its prevalence. Women around the world do 2.6 times the unpaid care and domestic work that men do, simply because that task is delegated to them by our societies.

Continue reading “Measuring beyond outcomes: Understanding gender inequality”
Development Matters
Policy

Equipping development co-operation to leave no one behind

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By Jorge Moreira da Silva, Director, OECD Development Co-operation Directorate

To read more about this topic, check out the upcoming release of the
Development Co-operation Report 2018: Joining Forces to Leave No One Behind
 on 11 December 2018

dev-cooperation-puzzle-handLeaving no one behind is a radically new level of ambition for governments and societies worldwide, for it implies that the Sustainable Development Goals will only be achieved if they deliver results for everyone and especially the furthest behind. By embracing the pledge in 2015 to leave no one behind, United Nations member states signed up to and entered a new era: one bound by the commitment to universal, equitable and sustainable development for all. Delivering on this agenda will require fundamental refocus and reform of systems, institutions and policies, from the global to the local levels.

Delivering on this central promise of the 2030 Agenda means lifting at least 730 million people out of extreme poverty – those who despite two decades of strong economic growth remain trapped in poverty, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and in fragile contexts. It also means addressing inequalities, discriminations and fragilities. According to the World Inequality Lab, inequalities leave less than 9% of global income to the poorest 50% of the world’s people. Intersecting discriminations and disadvantages afflict women and girls, minority groups and vulnerable populations around the world. An estimated 27% of humanity is expected to live in fragile contexts by 2030 due to the borderless reach of conflict, forced displacement, pandemics, violent extremism, famine and natural disasters. Time may already be running out: in some areas we are actually backsliding – for example, 40 million more people went undernourished between 2014 and 2017.

Continue reading “Equipping development co-operation to leave no one behind”

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