The United Nations General Assembly announced on Monday (25 December) that Morocco would host the inter-governmental conference on international migration in 2018. The UN commented that the event is expected to lead towards the adoption of an inter-governmentally negotiated agreement, known as “Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration.”
The Global Compact is a voluntary initiative based on commitments of chief executive officers (CEOs) to implement universal sustainability principles and to undertake partnerships in support of UN goals. The global compact for migration will be the first inter-governmentally negotiated agreement prepared under the auspices of the United Nations to cover all dimensions of international migration in a holistic and comprehensive way. In the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants that was adopted in 2016, the UN decided to develop a global deal for safe, orderly and regular migration.
The preparations started in the spring this year and the 2018 conference on international migration is poised to be a significant opportunity to improve the governance on migration to address the challenges associated with contemporary migration and to boost the contribution of migrants and migration on sustainable development. International migration is a complex phenomenon that touches on a multiplicity of economic, social and security aspects. More than ever before, migration touches all countries and people in the light of deepening globalization.
The current global estimate is that there were around 244 million international migrants in the world in 2015 – roughly 3.3 per cent of the global population – while the number of migrants moving within their countries is estimated at 740 million. Despite these numbers being proportionally very small, the increase in international migrants has been significant over time, as it’s been happening at a greater rate than earlier anticipated. For instance, a 2003 projection was that by 2050, international migrants would account for 2.6 percent of the global population (230 million), a rate that has already been surpassed.
