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Our newsfeeds are flooded with videos and articles about migrant workers walking over a 100 km a day to reach their respective hometowns. The suspension of trains and buses and the sealing of State borders has left several thousands stranded across the country. Which industries do these labourers mainly service?

Real estate is the third largest sector after agriculture and manufacturing to use migrant labour. Says Prashant Thakur, Director & Head Research, Anarock Property Consultants: Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, and Tamil Nadu account for more than half of the countrys total construction employment. As per the National Skill Development Council, the workforce employed by the construction and real estate sector is expected to grow to 76 million by 2022.

In the light of the lockdown, it is time to ask what industry bodies and developers are doing for their workers. Due to the unprecedented nature of the COVID-19 crisis, developers have been caught off guard and are unprepared to deal with the situation. However, many branded developers and major players are stepping forward with plans and policies to deal with this unforeseen situation, says Thakur.

Keeping a check

Niranjan Hiranandani, National President of the National Real Estate Development Council (NAREDCO), says, All industry bodies have communicated to their members the seriousness of the pandemics challenges and promised to assist migrant labourers as they are the most vulnerable. But, in the given scenario, he adds, we need to factor in that workers opting to move away from the sites to return to their villages is adding to the issue.

Arun Mn, Founder and Managing Director, Casagrand, explains that on-site accommodation and a daily food allowance is being provided to all the migrant labourers he employs. Basic sanitation facilities and wash areas have also been provided. We have arranged isolation rooms in each camp in case a need arises, he says. Migrant workers make up 80% of his total worker strength of 4,700. 50% of these workers are from Bihar, followed by Odisha (18%), West Bengal (15%), Uttar Pradesh (8%), Madhya Pradesh (6%), Jharkhand (2%) and Andhra Pradesh (1%).

Official guidelines (BOCW Act and Govt.)

Official directives

On March 23, the Directorate of Industrial Safety and Health sent out a circular instructing employers of Building and Other Construction Works (BOCW) establishments to comply with the provisions of the BOCW Act 1996 and the Inter-State Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Condition of Service) Act of 1979. The Act states that food, medical care and suitable accommodation, with separate space for cooking, bathing, washing and lavatory facilities are to be provided on-site or at a designated space nearby.

It also states that when more than 250 workers are employed and when more than 100 inter-State migrant workers are employed, canteen facilities must be provided. The rules also say that the contractor must ensure suitable and adequate medical facilities and preventive measures against epidemics and virus infections: The entire cost on treatment, hospital charges and the travel expenses from hospital to resident shall be borne by the contractor.

According to S. Sridharan, chairman of the Tamil Nadu chapter, the Confederation of Real Estate Developers Associations of India (CREDAI) has sent directives to its builder members. They are required to provide workers with food and other essentials. This is a tough time for the industry, and we have seen to it that all members are complying with the directives. Food and provisions are being supplied to labourers on-site and to those in camps. We have also intervened with contractors to ensure the supplies reach them, he says.

Cess funds

The Cess Act requires the construction industry to pay 1% of the total cost of their project towards the welfare of the labourers.

It is difficult to say how many have followed this directive but, on the ground, several developers are trying to do their bit, says Thakur of Anarock. Builders across cities are providing grains, pulses, vegetables, drinking water and milk. In many cases, building sites and camps housing workers are being fumigated and sanitised.

On-ground

According to Chitty Babu, Chairman and CEO of Akshaya, the 679 workers he employs have been sent to 10 labour colonies in Chennai and one in Trichy. We have been sensitising them on the issue and taking precautionary measures on-site as well. Accommodation, food, access to toilets and drinking water is being provided. We have ambulance and medical facilities as well.

Other builders say they are taking similar measures. If that is the case, what explains the mass exodus of labourers across States? The lapses have happened in a few parts of the country and need to be dealt with severely, said one industry source.

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What is the real estate industry doing to help their migrant labour workforce? - The Hindu

As the coronavirus crisis spreads, migrants attempting to enter Europe are in a vulnerable position with little or no help.

Just under a week ago, 56 people arrived on the Greek island of Lesbos.

The country is on lockdown but the migrants complain they've been given no protection.

"They said because of coronavirus you will be here 14 days," said this migrant from Afghanistan. "We are here 56 people, six African and all of us Afghans. They didn't give us gloves. They didn't give us any masks. "

The UN office on Lesbos described the camp living conditions as inhumane.

Last month neighbouring Turkey said it would no longer stop migrants from heading towards Greece.

The result is a border crisis between the two historic rivals. Greek authorities have said no migrants who arrived after March 1 will be able to apply for asylum. Instead, they will be detained pending deportation.

Camps on Lesbos and other islands of the eastern Aegean are already overcrowded and operating above their capacity.

The island's officials have complained there is no more room for new arrivals.

See the article here:
Migrants arriving in Greece say they have no protection against coronavirus - Euronews

A charity volunteer has launched a major clothing appeal to help provide dignity to women affected by the migrant crisis across Europe.

Jan Bettley, from Great Maplestead, is encouraging people to donate new pairs of underwear for female migrants who have sought refuge on islands across Greece.

While helping a team of volunteers to unload vital supplies on one of the Greek islands last year, Mrs Bettley was surprised to discover a drastic shortage of underwear for women, which prompted her to appeal for donations.

I believe women deserve the dignity of wearing their own underwear, said the 69-year-old.

Following her appeal, Mrs Bettley received hundreds of donations from her local Womens Institute group.

I was so proud of them and their friends who donated items, she said.

In November, 500 pairs of underwear were sent to a migrant camp, with the same amount of donations being delivered to Samos in February.

Keen to support migrants, Mrs Bettley, of Church Street, joined Hope and Aid Direct, as a volunteer.

Its a humanitarian disaster, and I thought, what can I do to help?, she said.

Run by volunteers, the charity provides vital supplies to vulnerable individuals and families across the world.

Despite their hardship, Mrs Bettley described the migrants resilience as awe-inspiring.

These women are so stoic they are just amazing, she said. They are living in total squalor and they are doing it with dignity.

Highlighting that it was considered a basic human right to own everyday essentials such as underwear, Mrs Bettley said the donations were always appreciated.

They deserve dignity and I feel that very strongly, she said.

To donate items, call 07901 711394, or email jan@janhancock.co.uk.

Businesses are also being sought to serve as drop-off points for donations.

See the rest here:
Charity volunteer launches clothing appeal in support of women impacted by migrant crisis - Suffolk Free Press

The coronavirus spread into Italy about one month ago. Early warnings from the authorities didnt give the impression that the disease could bring with it thousands of deaths and, despite the reality in Wuhan, for several weeks we kept speaking about it as if it were just another seasonal flu.

At the end of February, my grandfather died. He was an old man, with comorbidity and terminal cancer. The doctors didnt investigate too much further. But many other people died in these same weeks, and not all of them were old, or had a previous advanced chronic disease.

Soon after, the whole of Italy went into a complete lockdown. All of a sudden, everything stopped. And an issue that was dominating the news until the day before, disappeared from the general concern: themigration crisis. What would happen to it now that Italy was facing the coronavirus pandemic?

Sharing the full story, not just the headlines

The nationwide lockdown didnt only mean empty streets and empty bars. The humanitarian vessels operating in the Mediterranean have mooredin Italian ports, put in quarantine after disembarking the last people they could rescue at sea. Civil aerial reconnaissance aircrafts are grounded. The Lampedusa hotspot has been locked into quarantine.

Despite the current health emergency in Italy, however, desperate departures from the northern coasts of Africa have not stopped.

On 14 March, the Alarm Phone NGO monitoring for distress calls at sea reported two distress cases of ships carrying more than 200 castaways in international waters between Malta and Lampedusa.

The majority (112 of them) had already been located by a Frontex aerial asset in the early morning, as reported by sources in Alarm Phone and documented by Angela Caponnetto, Italian reporter covering Lampedusa. The 112 on board spent about 48 hours at sea before being eventually rescued by Maltese authorities, 18 hours after receiving the Alarm Phone alert.

The remaining castaways were on a rubber dinghy in sight of the Maltese oil tanker ship Gineshli since the early morning. Alarm Phone recordings testify how migrants on the dinghy had been communicating with the tanker to ask for floaters and water.

Instead of coordinating with its tanker, Malta called up the Libyan Coastguard, guiding the Libyan vessel Ras Al Jadar to the second distress case of the day. The 46 people on board were intercepted and taken back to Libya when they were only 80 miles away from the Maltese coast.

It is not the first time that the so-called Libyan Coast Guard, reportedly made of armed militias trained in Europe and cooperating with EU border agency Frontex, are called in to perform illegal push-back operations inside European rescue-zones.

On the night of the 9 February, Aita Mari, the rescue ship of the Basque humanitarian organisation Salvamento Martimo Humanitario, witnessed another joint operation between La Valletta and the Libyans happening in Maltese waters. Michele Angioni, the first officer on board the Spanish ship, said that the humanitarians offered to intervene, but the Maltese authorities ordered them to stay away from the case as a military plane, probably Maltese, was flying over the rubber dinghy.

A reconstruction of the events based on the testimonies of the people on board and collected by Alarm Phone shows how the Maltese Armed Forces, first to arrive on the scene, had purposely delayed the rescue operation so as to allow for the arrival of the Libyan coastguard to bring the dinghy back to Libya.

This operation, illegal under international law, was prevented only by the castaways jumping into the water once they had understood what was happening.

In November last year, The Times of Malta exposed a secret deal between Malta and Libya to prevent further migrant arrivals, a negotiation that involves coordinated intervention by the Armed Forces of Malta and the Libyan coastguard. A similar negotiation was already revealed taking place between Italy and Libya, when known Libyan traffickers were invited by the Italian intelligence for a round table in Sicily, in 2017.

The coastal countries reluctance to take responsibility is reflected by the purposeful delay in rescue operations, which now has no more witnesses, as the humanitarian assets are all blocked in quarantine because of the coronavirus emergency.

Non-assistance, purposive delays, and even pushback are becoming the new norm in the Maltese and Italian rescuezones, causing more disappearances and deaths, both at sea and in Libya. But at the times of coronavirus, there is no humanitarian presence at sea, which can monitor, denounce and counter these crimes.

Top: Nabi Younes market, Mosul

Bottom: Charles Bridge, Prague

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Top: Nabi Younes market, Mosul

Bottom: Charles Bridge, Prague

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The fact that so many people are still attempting to cross the Mediterranean despite the lockdown of European countries and the absence of NGO ships in quarantine is strong proof against those accusing NGOs of being responsible for the so-called migration pull-factor. Once again, it has become clear that the only thing driving this crisis is a push factor: the deprivation of the most basic human rights in the middle of a civil war in Libya. Thats why the coronavirus outbreak wont stop people fleeing Libya and seeking asylum in Europe.

Even at the time of the coronavirus emergency, people fleeing Libya have the fundamental right to save themselves and demand asylum. The coronavirus pandemic should not trump on anyones right to live and escape violence and war. Aid coming to Italy to tackle the pandemic should also take into consideration the fact that Italy and Malta are still the safe ports for people fleeing the hell of Libya. They too, are facing this pandemic.

Valeria Alice Colombo is an Italian Doctor and Crew member onSea Watch 3.She is also a member of the journalistic collective Brush&Bow

Read more:
Im a medic on a rescue ship in Italy right now, authorities are using coronavirus as an excuse to let migrants die - The Independent

Mar 26th 2020

WHATS NIGERIAS second city? asks Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, an irrepressible economist and former finance minister of Nigeria, before chuckling: London! She is exaggerating (about 200,000 people who were born in Nigeria live in Britain) but she has a point: one of the most powerful trends shaping Africa, and the wider world, is migration. There are three different types: to the West, within Africa and from countryside to city. All are helping make the continent richer and better educated.

Although many talk about waves of African migrants crossing into Europe, the numbers are still modest. Just 2.5% of Africans, or about 36m people, live abroad, compared with a global average of about 3.4%. Of those, less than half leave the continent.

Even so, African migrants generate a disproportionate share of headlines in rich countries. This is partly because nearly half of those who died crossing the Mediterranean during the height of the migrant crisis of 2015 were sub-Saharan Africans. But it is also because populist politicians have stoked fear of migration in many countries. In South Africa, which is home to about 2.2m mostly African migrants, politicians accuse foreigners of taking jobs and committing crimes. This rabble-rousing has led to repeated bouts of anti-foreigner rioting. Matteo Salvini, a former deputy prime minister of Italy, banned rescue ships carrying migrants from Italian waters, and Donald Trump has severely restricted immigration from several African countries including Nigeria.

But it is also because of concerns that the numbers of African migrants will rise dramatically. In 2017 the Pew Research Centre asked people in several African countries whether they would move to another country if they could. About three-quarters in Ghana and Nigeria said they would. So did more than half of Kenyans and South Africans. The reason is simple. The average earnings of African migrants to Europe is $1,020 a month, three times the pay back home, says the UNDP. One reason more people do not move is the high cost charged by people smugglerson average about $2,400 for men and $3,900 for womenup to 20 times median monthly earnings in the countries they leave. Over the decade to 2017 about 1m Africans migrated to Europe. As Africa grows richer more people will be able to move, and migration will probably increase, argues Sir Paul Collier, a development economist.

Even if Africas migration rates were simply to rise to the global average, its fast-growing population would mean tens of millions of people would be on the move. This would be no bad thing. Though more rich countries seem to be putting up barriers, without migration Europes population is forecast to fall by about 10% by 2050. It is also ageing: for every 100 people of working age, there would be 118 retirees and children by 2060. Germany alone would need 500,000 migrants a year to offset its demographic decline.

Stephen Smith, who wrote a book on migration, worries that it is draining Africa of its educated young. Yet that overlooks the many benefits of migration, including how it is helping increase skills and education within Africa.

The easiest benefits to measure are the remittances that migrants send home. Nigeria, for instance, got $24.3bn in 2018 from its citizens working abroad, a 24% increase over 2016 and about eight times more than it receives in development aid. That is also more than ten times what Nigeria got in foreign investment in 2018. Senegalese working in Spain send back as much as half of their earnings (helping remittances make up 9% of Senegals national income). Not only are such flows far larger than aid, they are also often better spent. A big chunk of aid budgets goes on administration and buying four-wheel-drive cars for aid workers, but most of what migrants send goes directly to recipients (though, scandalously, fees charged by money agents can gobble up to a fifth of the cash). It is also often invested in education, housing and businesses. In Ghana children in families who get help from a relative abroad are 54% more likely to attend secondary school. Lower fees on money transfers could boost private spending on education by about $1bn a year, reckons UNESCO.

Rather than draining the continent of skills, migration shows those at home the benefits of an education, encouraging more people to go to school. About 400,000 Africans study at universities abroad, making up about a tenth of all foreign students worldwide (about the same number as China sent to study abroad in 2005 and about half as many as India does today). In 1960 when the Democratic Republic of Congo gained its independence the whole country had fewer than 30 university graduates. Now it has about 12,000 students studying at foreign universities.

Migrants in democratic societies help promote democracy back home

This means that large numbers of bright youngsters are getting exposed to societies that are often more democratic, less corrupt and with more productive business environments than those they grew up in. Research supports the idea that migrants in democratic societies help promote democracy back home. One study of Senegalese living in America and France found that many were urging their family members to register to vote in elections. Another study, this time in Mali, found that returning migrants were more likely to vote. Their civic-mindedness seems infectious. Voter turnout rises even among non-migrants in neighbourhoods with returnees. The diaspora also provides a haven for the opposition. Oromo activists in America played a key role in the protests that have pushed Ethiopia in a more democratic direction.

It is not just politics that is being transformed but also business. Some returnees are actual rocket scientists such as Kwami Williams, a Ghanaian-born American who studied aerospace engineering at MIT and was about to take a job at NASA before he changed course and set up a business in Ghana. Or Ikenna Nzewi, a Nigerian-American who studied computer science at Yale before teaming up with two pals from MIT and Duke to set up a business, Releaf, to collect and process palm-oil kernels from smallholder farmers in Nigeria. Rather than migration leading to a brain drain or brain gain, it is actually circular, with people moving, learning new skills and then moving again, says Stephen Gelb of the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), a London think-tank.

The second big wave of migration is people moving within Africa. More than half of African migrants stay on the continent, most of them travelling along well-established migratory routes such as one that links Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast. There, about 10% of the population are migrants yet they generate close to 20% of its GDP. Migration boosts productivity in many other places. A study by the OECD found that because foreigners working in South Africa brought skills that were missing from the labour market, they did not take jobs from locals. Instead they helped boost employment and wages of South African-born workers, bumping up income per person by as much as 5%.

Countries that send migrants elsewhere in Africa also see many benefits through trade and investment. Lots of people like to eat the food they grew up with, so many end up importing it after they have moved elsewhere, an effect big enough to stand out in trade statistics compiled by UNCTAD. This is also true when they move to the rich world. They are creating a cultural melting-pot of music and film, too. African youth culture is going to have a fundamental influence on global youth culture, argues Cobus Van Staden at Wits University. It is exportable because it is open and deeply in conversation across cultures, he says, citing as an example how musicians from different African countries collaborate.

The third great migration is the shifting of people from the countryside to cities. Africas population is still largely rural, with just 41% living in cities. But this is changing fast. The number of people living in African cities is growing by 3.6% a year, compared with 2.4% in China and India. This rapid growth, a result of both a still-high birth rate and migration, means that Africas cities have to accommodate about 20m extra people each year. The UN reckons that over the next decade, all ten of the worlds fastest-growing cities will be in Africa. These include Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, which will almost double to about 11m people.

Many of the benefits of the other two sorts of migration are also seen when people move to cities. In Ghana three-quarters of people who moved from villages to slums sent money to their families back home. Almost nine-tenths thought their lives were better.

Africa is not only urbanising much more quickly than any other continent, it is also doing so at a much lower level of wealth than Asia or South America did. In other parts of the world the movement of people to the cities has generally meant a move into more productive jobs. But in Africa young people often end up hawking vegetables or trinkets on the side of the road. This is because many of the continents cities are so sprawling, with narrow jammed roads and poor infrastructure, that people cannot easily get to jobs. Nairobi, for instance, has one of the longest average commuting times anywhere because 41% of people walk to work.

It also costs a lot to transport food to cities, which pushes up prices and in turn forces up wages in factories, making it hard for them to compete on global markets. In short, many have become consumption cities with urban economies dominated by low-value services and goods that are consumed locally, rather than tradable goods or services. Better urban planning with denser housing instead of sprawling slums, with wider roads and public transport, would all go a long way to making cities more productive. So would reliable electricity: a study by the Centre for Global Development in Washington, DC, found that one of the biggest obstacles faced by Nigerias technology startups was frequent power cuts. You cant code in the dark, says the founder of one firm.

But some of the solutions to urban problems can also be found in the countryside. A good place to start is by helping farmers become more productive. That could reduce food costs in the cities, making them more competitive for manufacturing. Higher incomes in villages could expand markets for goods made in the cities. Sometimes the path to industrialisation starts on the farm.

This article appeared in the Special report section of the print edition under the headline "Young, bright and on the move"

Read the rest here:
Migration is helping Africa in many ways - The Economist