Structured Approach Regional Migration Supports Achievement of SDGs

Francesco Carella

A strategic approach to regional migration can support accelerated progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, as good migration governance contributes to all seventeen of the Sustainable Development Goals.  Francesco Carella is the Regional Specialist on Labor Migration and Mobility with the International Labor Organization.

Francesco Carella, Regional Specialist, ILO

“I think SDG 5 and the gender aspect is really crucial.  I was looking at some ECLAC data before this session and we see that out of all Caribbean migrants in the United States, for example, fifty-five percent are women.  That in the case of Caribbean countries such as Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent & the Grenadines, Trinidad & Tobago, over fifty percent of the migrants are women.  In the case of Barbados, approximately sixty percent, so it’s really crucial to take that aspect into consideration.  So I was saying that many of these SDG’s have direct connections or explicit connections to the topic of migration.  You see in this table an example of several SDGs that mention specifically migration or mobility.  On SDG 4 on education, quality education, we have a reference to student mobility, for example, in target 4.B.  In SDG 5, in gender equality, as we’ve already mentioned, we have specific references to human trafficking and exploitation which we also find in SDG 8.”