Weitzenegger's Migration and Diaspora Communities Report

Migration restrictions and the ‘brain drain’: The wrong response to an ill-defined problem.
http://www.odi.org.uk/publications/opinions/98migrationapr08.pdf
Is restricting migration an effective response to personnel shortages in the developing world? And is the fear of a brain drain really justified? ODI Paper.

Mentori - Share your business skills for a better world.
http://www.mentori.org
Mentori connects you online with people from developing countries who value your expertise. Its simple. You can volunteer anytime, anywhere, from any computer. Mentori offers the Diaspora the opportunity to do a ''virtual return” home.

Migration can help fight global poverty, according to new OECD report
http://www.oecd.org/document/...
Better and more coherent migration policies can contribute to the fight against global poverty. This is the main conclusion of ''Migration and Developing Countries'', a new report by the OECD Development Centre that was presented at the German Ministry for Economic Co-operation and Development. People, goods and capital move across international borders: this is what globalisation really means. The effects of trade and capital flows have been measured and quantified by the OECD and others and are widely known. Flows of people and their impact on development, however, are much less understood. By focussing on the costs and benefits of the movement of people Migration and Developing Countries shows how all parties can benefit from migration: migrants’ countries of destination, their home countries, and migrants themselves. Emigration, say the book’s authors, can reduce unemployment for low-skilled workers in migrant-sending countries, while remittances fuel consumption and investment, helping to reduce poverty. While migration can contribute to development, development does not immediately halt international migration. International development assistance – aid – is not necessarily; therefore, a means of influencing migration flows. For this reason, Migration and Developing Countries calls for mutually reinforcing aid and migration policies. In this way, say the authors, developing countries can derive greater economic benefits from the mobility of their citizens. One example could be to link policies facilitating the recruitment of skilled workers to aid policies underpinning training and capacity building in the sending country. To unlock the development potential of international migration, policy makers in rich and poor countries must recognise that neither migration policies nor aid policies alone are enough in isolation to stimulate and maintain the momentum of development. OECD countries need to consider the development impact of their migration policies, while migrant-sending countries must rethink their development policies in the light of labour mobility. Moreover, migrants’ associations, enterprises and banks dealing with migrants and their families all play a role in increasing the development pay off of international migration.

Rural employment and migration: In search of decent work
http://www.odi.org.uk/publications/briefing/bpruralemploymentoct07.pdf
This ODI Briefing Paper by Steve Wiggins and Priya Deshingkar looks at new thinking on rural employment which is needed to create more and better rural jobs. Growth in agriculture is essential, and growth in the rural non-farm economy is especially important. Job prospects improve as education, skills, health and early nutrition levels rise. Rural-urban migration (whether temporary or permanent) opens new opportunities and also helps tighten rural labour markets. With rising productivity and wages, it becomes easier to push for better labour standards, to reduce child labour and correct gender inequalities.

Migration: New Policies for Greater Gains
http://www.oecd.org/document/...
Migration can benefit all parties involved: migrant-sending countries, migrant-receiving countries and the migrants themselves; says the OECD Development Centre in a report on Gaining from Migration: Towards a New Mobility System.

International Migration, Economic Development & Policy
http://publications.worldbank.org/...
This book World Bank provides new evidence on the impact of migration and remittances on several development indicators. Additionally, the book analyzes the effect of host country policies on migration flows, examines the determinants of return and repeat migration, and explores the degree of success of return.

Global Forum on migration and development
http://www.eu2007.pt/UE/vEN/NoticiasDocumentos/news1o.htm
More than 120 governments as well as regional and International Organisations met for the first meeting of the Global Forum on migration and development in Brussels on 10 July. This meeting aimed to discuss more consistent ways of strengthening the positive impacts between migration and development policies.

IDB/MIF: 2008 Call for proposals: Financing facility for remittances
http://www.iadb.org/mif/newsDetail.cfm?language=English&ID=48
The Financing Facility for Remittances is opening its 2008 call for proposals on ''Promoting innovative remittance systems and investment channels for migrants''.

A conceptual framework for understanding the role of cash transfers in social protection

http://www.odi.org.uk/go?where=pb5
ODI Project Briefing by Rachel Slater, John Farrington, Rebecca Holmes and Paul Harvey, defines a conceptual framework for cash transfers in social protection, that focuses on three spheres: institutions, politics and governance; capacity and implementation; and local economic and social impacts.

The Role of Remittances in Leveraging Sustainable Development in Latin America and the Caribbean
http://www.microfinancegateway.org/files/46093file46.pdf
This Accion Internacional paper deliberates on the type of financial services which can help leverage the economic impact of remittances.

Remittances from Germany and their Routes to Migrants' Origin Countries
http://www2.gtz.de/dokumente/bib/07-1374.pdf
Germany is one of the most important countries of origin for remittances— money transfers from migrants. In 2006 they amounted to approximately ten billion euros. However, as this study shows, migrants face considerable difficulties with the transfer process. Despite its large volume, the market for money transfers is extremely intransparent. Intensive research is needed to discover which financial institutions offer what kind of services, and at what cost. In some cases the cost of these services is extremely high. The result is that transfers are frequently made through informal channels.

Sending Money Home: Worldwide Remittance Flows to Developing Countries
http://www.ifad.org/events/remittances/maps
Remittances, the portion of migrant workers' earnings sent back ome to their families, have been a critical means of financial support for generations. But, for the most part, these flows have historically been ''hidden in plain view'', often uncounted and even ignored. All that is now changing - as the scale of migration increases, the corresponding growth in remittances is gaining widespread attention. Today, the impact of remittances is recognized in all developing regions of the world, constituting an important flow of foreign currency to most countries and directly reaching millions of households, totalling approximately 10 per cent of the world's population. The importance of remittances to poverty alleviation is obvious, but the potential multiplier effect on economic growth and investment is also significant. The driving force behind this phenomenon is an estimated 150 million migrants worldwide who sent more than US$300 billion to their families in developing countries during 2006, typically US$100, US$200 or US$300 at a time, through more than 1.5 billion separate financial transactions. These funds are used primarily to meet immediate family needs (consumption) but a significant portion is also available for savings, credit mobilization and other forms of investment. In other words, the world's largest poverty alleviation programme could also become an effective grass roots economic development programme, particularly in the rural areas that present some of the greatest challenges to financial inclusion.
Leveraging Efforts on Remittances and Financial Intermediation
http://www2.gtz.de/wbf/library/detail.asp?number=3557
Manuel Orozco and Rachel Fedewa / INTAL 2006 Recent policy recommendations have stressed the importance of linking remittances to financial intermediation as a strategy to harness the development impact of such earnings. This paper attempts to identify emergent trends in the remittance and finance world that potentially point to a deepening connection between remittances and development vis-à-vis financial intermediation. It is a case study analysis of nine financial institutions, and focusing on three basic indicators: institutional ability to provide remittance transfers to its clients and community, to offer low cost remittance services, and to compliment transfer services with other financial services.