PRESENTER
Rebekah Smith, Executive Director, Labor Mobility Partnerships
PANELISTS
Dawit Dame, Innovation Manager, Ethiopian Jobs Creation Commission
Dr. K.P. Krishnan, IEPF Chair Professor in Regulatory Economics, National Council of Applied Economic Research in India
Dr. Sunday Onazi, Chief Labour Officer, International Labour Migration Division, Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment in Nigeria
Grégoire Douxchamps and Zainab Naji, Pilot Project Addressing Labour Shortages Through Innovative Labour Migration Models (PALIM) Project, Enabel Belgium
MODERATOR
Devesh Kapur, Starr Foundation South Asia Studies Professor and Asia Programs Director, Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University
While high-income countries face rapidly shrinking working-age populations, these same populations in low-income countries are sharply increasing. Bridging these markets through labor mobility offers transformative benefits for low-income countries; beyond offering quality employment opportunities for their workers, associated remittances and skill accumulation can effect powerful positive change on their development outcomes.
However, there are a number of factors limiting sending countries’ ability to unlock the potential of labor mobility for their people. Ironically, labor mobility has often been viewed as a failure of development, leading to a negative narrative making it difficult to promote labor mobility. Beyond this, there are a number of challenges relating to labor mismatch, legal frameworks, and implementation that limit their ability to expand employment opportunities through mobility. Solving these challenges will require a multi-faceted effort with receiving country governments, employers, and a quality mobility industry.
In this event, we heard from representatives from sending countries across regions on the impacts of labor mobility in their countries, the challenges they have experienced, and how these challenges can be overcome to let workers fill needed jobs.
This event is the second in Labor Mobility Partnerships’ (LaMP’s) monthly event series on the case for labor mobility from the perspectives of key actors (receiving countries, sending countries, employers, workers, and ‘mobility industry’). Sign up for our newsletter to stay updated on future events!