Migration continues to dominate the UK’s political discussion, crystallising in the past fortnight as a new asylum policy that “prevents people jumping the [asylum] queue”.
Those who have visited the UK will know that adhering to queues is as much a defining feature of British society as tea and scones or Premier League football. Jumping the queue is simply not on.
The debate today finds itself polarised between commitments to control borders and a desire for a functioning immigration system, not dissimilar to the one taking place “across the pond” in the US.
South Africans are no less likely to debate migration and its impacts; indeed, the subject finds prominence in our political conversation. Where the UK has “the channel” and the US its southern border, South Africans have Beitbridge. All are political footballs kicked about their respective fields.
Regardless of geographic borders or idiosyncratic debates on migration, one fact should not be lost in this political ruckus — migration is going to increase and the problem is not going to be fixed by policy solely designed to restrict the movement of people. Good policy mitigates risks and maximises benefits. There is immense value in tapping into the economic potential migration has for both domestic and foreign markets.
In the 21st century no migration policy or accompanying bureaucratic procedures are prepared for what is to come. Climate-induced migration, the effect of which we have just started to witness, will be a defining feature of our time. Numbers can sometimes make the point clearer than words: by 2050 about 86-million sub-Saharan African and 40-million South Asian migrants will be forced from their homes due to climate related losses in livelihood. The cost of weather-related disasters? A cool $250bn-$300bn per annum, according to the UN Office For Disaster Risk Reduction.
Seasonal work visas
Climate mitigation projects will help, but these efforts are not the solution. Immigration policy requires a new approach. One such is proffered by Oxford University professor Lant Pritchett, who suggests policymakers in the West (where populations are declining) take advantage of a globalised labour market through the establishment of new forms of seasonal work visas.
Such visas could serve the dual purpose of plugging gaps in local labour markets while granting migrants access to jobs that pay far more than they would in their home countries. These would satisfy the human need to earn a living and remain connected with one’s home, place of birth and family — a need your correspondent understands all too well.
Some cry shock-horror at a proposal of this sort, arguing that SA cannot afford to lose any skilled labour, let alone our best and brightest, to foreign lands. The brain drain is real, but the economics of “losing” talent is less clear. Foreign workers send significant portions of their salaries back home in the form of remittances, providing their extended families with capital.
Nigerians alone sent about $19bn home in 2019, with personal remittances making up 2.5% of Sub-Saharan Africa’s GDP. Entire industries have been born out of an integrated global financial system converging with globalised labour markets — fintech is booming on the continent because of this.
On the other side of the economic analysis, econometric studies out of the US show evidence of an “immigration surplus” of up to $72bn, an economic dividend accrued to domestic populations as a result of immigration. In SA the experience is similar, with a 2018 International Labour Organisation study estimating that immigration to SA could raise income per capita by about 5%.
We live in a world where billions of dollars in capital can be sent and received within seconds. Globalised financial markets have bestowed enormous benefits. Perhaps now is a time to try something new, combining globalised capital with a globalised and integrated labour market.
• Nott is co-convener of the Vaccine Safety & Confidence Building Working Group at Columbia University and a working group member of the G7 Global Partnership — Africa Biosecurity Signature Initiative. He has policy experience from the Global Economic Governance Programme at the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, the Institute for African Alternatives in Cape Town, and the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
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