Greater Partnerships for the Effective Management of Labor Migration in Asia

The pace and size of labor migration have been on the rise in past decades, largely due to the different stages of economic development across Asia. Labor migration flows from Asia peaked in 2015 and dropped in the following 2 years, falling to 5.2 million in 2017, the lowest level since 2011. The decrease of about 6% in 2017 reversed the upward trend (Figure 1). Reduced recruitment in the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, the top destinations for Asian workers, was the main reason behind this downward trend (ADBI, OECD, and ILO 2019). The changes in the labor migration trend and its characteristics are described in the recently published ADBI-OECD-ILO migration report