Between January and August 2012, the Global Migration Futures project of the International Migration Institute and the Regional Mixed Migration Secretariat in Nairobi collaborated to explore possible scenarios for the future of migration in the Horn of Africa and Yemen over the next 20 years.
The IRIN article, entitled ‘In-Depth: Imagining the future of migration’, quotes Simona Vezzoli of IMI: ‘When we looked at forecasts on migration, we realized there were some shortfalls. Those approaches…can’t take into account all the factors that aren’t quantifiable and those that are very uncertain.’
A final report on future migration in the Horn of Africa and Yemen asserts that migration levels in the region are still relatively low, but that there is significant potential for those levels to rise.
The report posits two future migration scenarios for the region by 2030.
The two very different scenarios demonstrate that, as Chris Horwood from RMMS puts it, ‘migration is here to stay’ and ‘governments need to manage [it], rather than just react to it as some kind of plague’.