UN Education Outreach | Film Your Issue 2008

Video courtesy of UNTV

Migration

Migration is the mass movement of people, legally or illegally, voluntarily or forced, in search of a better life. We see evidence of it in our cities, towns and villages. Migration is also triggered by economic necessity or persecution, conflict or war.

In 2001 the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Council identified International Migration as one of the OECD’s priorities. Migration is an increasingly pressing issue, for immigrant and emigrant countries, their governments and the general public. It raises a host of social, economic, development and foreign policy challenges and opportunities.

The Global Commission on International Migration was launched by the United Nations Secretary-General and a number of governments on December 9, 2003 in Geneva. It is comprised of 19 Commissioners, is independent and was given the mandate to provide the framework for the formulation of a coherent, comprehensive and global response to the issue of international migration.

The Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations held the International Symposium on International Migration and Development in collaboration with Fondazione Rosselli and with the support of the Italian Government, in Turin, Italy, from 28 to 30 June 2006. The purpose of the Symposium was to debate, at the substantive level, key issues that Governments, international organizations and civil society face in addressing the challenges and opportunities posed by international migration. It also focused on relevant policy questions about ways of enhancing the contribution of international migration to development.

Topics covered during the Symposium:
How to manage temporary labour migration, how to facilitate the flow of remittances and improve their impact on development, how to increase the benefits while mitigating the costs of the migration of skilled personnel, how to engage transnational communities in the development process of countries of origin, how to make return migration an asset, how best to collaborate in reducing and preventing the smuggling of, and trafficking in, persons across borders, how to benefit from the opportunities of the globalization of education.

Create films on the impact of immigration and/or emigration in your communities

Additional information:
http://www.un.org/esa/population/unpop.htm

On 9, 10 and 11 July 2007 the first meeting of the Global Forum on Migration and Development took place in Brussels: http://www.gfmd-fmmd.org