Employment opportunities and food security of returnee migrant workers have improved while health and psychosocial challenges dropped in the months after the government lifted the nationwide shutdown.
However, household debt had increased and migrant households were adopting negative coping measures including reducing expenditure on health and borrowing money to pay back loans, a recent report of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said.
The findings from the second round of data collection are presented in the report, “Rapid Assessment Round 2: Needs and Vulnerabilities of Internal and International Return Migrants in Bangladesh”. The latest round of data collection was completed in August and September 2020 in 12 high return-migration districts in Bangladesh.
A total of 1,584 respondents took part, including 875 international return migrants and 709 internal return migrants, according to a press release, Issued by IOM Dhaka office on Tuesday.
In June 2020, IOM interviewed 2,765 internal and international migrant workers who had returned to Bangladesh and then re-interviewed 1,584 of the respondents three months later.
The findings provide stakeholders with an understanding of the socioeconomic impacts of the crisis, the challenges migrants face with reintegration and the importance of building back the resilience of migrant communities.
The study indicated that there was a 20 per cent increase of international returnees that reported that they were facing challenges (round one – 50 per cent; round two 71 per cent).
The most prevalent primary challenges reported were difficulty in finding a job (47 per cent), financial problems (29 per cent) and repayment of debt (21 per cent).
Among the respondents available for round two survey the unemployment rate dropped to 64 per cent. Among the same respondents the unemployment rate was 74 per cent in May to June 2020.
The decline in unemployment may be attributed, at least partially, to the easing of shutdown measures at the end of May and the lifting of general business curfews and other restrictions at the beginning of September. Nevertheless, unemployment among respondents remained high.
The number of international returnee households reportedly eating three meals a day increased from June to September by 18 per cent and by 43 per cent to 92 per cent for internal returnee households.
The findings indicate that international returnees, who were unable to secure jobs, were more likely to apply for government assistance (60 per cent) than internal returnees (39 per cent).
Both internal and international migrants reported borrowing money, reducing expenditures, and depending on donations to cope with financial issues and to repay debt.
In the face of financial problems, returnees coped by borrowing money or taking out additional loans (50 per cent of international return migrants and 71 per cent of internal migrants).
More than half of respondents that had returned from abroad reported they have debts of over Tk 100,000 while 28 per cent reported debts of over Tk 200,000.
A total of 58 per cent of international returnees and 53 per cent of internal returnees indicated that their debts had increased from June to September 2020.
The number of respondents wishing to return abroad remained high (78 per cent) and the most popular intended countries of destination was India, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Italy and Malaysia.
There was a decrease in certainty of timelines for remigration abroad and respondents reported this was due to the ongoing uncertainty regarding visas and vaccine access, restrictions on international travel, and the cost of travel.
In comparison, there was a 10 per cent decline in respondents reporting they wanted to migrate internally and of the total (75 per cent), almost half indicated that they would choose to move to Dhaka (47 per cent), while Chattogram (15 per cent) and Barisal (13 per cent) were the next most popular destinations.
Giorgi Gigauri, chief of mission of IOM in Bangladesh said, “We are living through an unprecedented crisis and in order to recover better and faster, we need research to better understand how communities coped with unemployment and lockdowns and what their migration aspirations are”.
The information from research will help them strengthen support systems to provide migrant workers protection against future outbreaks of international concern.
“The findings of our study support global indications that the Covid-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted people on the move,” he said.
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