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I. MIGRATION FROM UKRAINE FOR EMPLOYMENT WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF GLOBAL MIGRATION PROCESSES

1. Main Causes of Migration for employment

Judging from different estimates, the world today numbers from 150 million to 175 million people (over 3% of the world population) who live outside of the countries of their origin, including about 12 million refugees and asylum seekers. This figure grows by at least three millions each year.

Migration appeared and developed simultaneously with mankind itself. There is not a single country in the world that at different stages of its development was not affected by global migration processes in one way or another – either as a donor country supplying labor resources or as a receiving (host) country of labor.

This development became the more evident with the emergence of the modern global economic system, when all countries are becoming more interdependent and interrelated. The global trends of today show that the problems of migration continue to distress mankind, becoming one of the most important factors of global changes.

The understanding of the reasons of emergence and regularities of development of global migration processes makes it possible for every state to frame such a policy that would accord as best as possible with its national interests in this area.

Without disputing the comprehensive nature of the reasons of global migration processes, the Commissioner for Human Rights believes that their main factors are socioeconomic.

If we look at the dynamics of the distribution pattern of incomes between different countries, we see the evident upward trend of the already disproportionately large gap in the population’s average incomes between the industrially developed countries and the countries of the Third World.

While in 1870 per capita income in the US exceeded nine times the similar rate in the world’s poorest countries, in 1960 this gap was 50 times as large. According to the data of UN experts, the developing countries will be inhabited by an absolute majority of the world population – 7.8 billion (currently 4.8 billion of the 6 billion). Today 80% of the world population is trapped in a struggle for survival, while in 25 years this rate will be about 90%.

The opportunity to earn more than is possible at home is one of the reasons why hundreds of thousands of people leave their countries in search of a better lot abroad.

What is decisive in this case is not so much the average income a migrant can earn as the difference in the incomes between the country of his destination and the country of his origin.

There are a number of economic indicators which make it possible to asses the level of a country’s development and which, accordingly, impact on the geographical pattern of migration for employment.

One of the indicators is the gross domestic product (GDP) per capita adjusted to the purchasing power parity (PPP). Throughout many years they have been calculated by the UN and are among the three indicators that are taken into account when measuring the human development index (HDI).

The main data of adjusted GDP per capita of the countries of Europe, North America and the CIS for the year 2000 are presented in Table 1.1. The latter also states the rate of adjusted GDP per capita of each country relative to Ukraine.

Table 1.1. GDP per capita in different countries in 2000

According to UN data, in terms of adjusted GDP per capita, the indicator of which in 2000 for Ukraine amounted to US $3,816, our country holds 102nd place in the world beside Guatemala and Surinam and 8th place among the countries of the former Soviet Union after Estonia, Russia, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan (see Annex 1). The ratio between the richest country in this list, Estonia, and Ukraine was 2.64, while between Ukraine and the poorest Tajikistan 0.3.

The indicator for Luxembourg – the country with the world’s largest GDP per capita in 2000 – exceeded the similar indicator for Ukraine 13.12 times, while the gap between the US and Ukraine was 8.95 times, Germany – 6.58 times, Italy – 6.19 times, the UK – 6.16 times, Spain – 5.1 times, Portugal – 4.53 times, and Greece – 4.32 times.

A marked gap is also evident between Ukraine and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. In 2000 GDP per capita in Ukraine was 3.67 times less than in the Czech Republic, 3.25 times less than in Hungary, 2.95 times less than in Slovakia, 2.37 times less than in Poland, and 1.68 times less than in Romania. The ratio between Ukraine and the EU countries in 2000 was on the average 6.75 times, while for the countries of Eastern Europe 2.15 times. GDP per capita in the Russian Federation in 2000 exceeded 2.2 times the corresponding Ukrainian indicator.

The marked gap in the GDP per capita between Ukraine and other countries of Europe and the world is among the objective factors that impact on the migration processes and occasion, in particular, the destinations of Ukraine’s migrant workers. The difference in the amount of average pay in different countries is yet another important criterion, which considerably affects the dynamics of world migration processes, relative to Ukraine included. The corresponding figures are presented in Table 1.2. The basic point of departure in this respect is the average hourly pay in industry.

Table 1.2. Hourly pay in industry (in US $)*

* Source: Morgan Stanley and Co. Inc., 1996

According to the data of the State Statistics Committee of Ukraine (SSC), wages per one industrial worker in 2002 came to UAH 3.26 per one hour (US $0.6). When compared with what workers earned in other countries in 1995, the approximately estimated gap in average hourly pay in industry, specifically between Ukraine and the Czech Republic, would be not less than twice as much, Hungary – three times, Poland – 3.4 times, Spain – over 21 times, Italy – over 27 times, France – over 32 times, Austria – over 42 times, and Germany – more than 53 times.

However, it should be pointed out that migrant workers earn less than the nationals for the same qualification and even much less if they work illegally. For all that, their earnings are higher than what their fellow countrymen receive back home.

For example, a Ukrainian construction worker in Italy earns an average of 1,200 liras a month, i.e. about US $520 dollars, while an Italian is paid for the same work not less than US $2,000.

Economic growth of a host country is also an important factor of migration processes when there is need in more workers, low-skilled workers included. It is an additional factor that stimulates the inflow of migrant workers. Such a process is now under way in Portugal, where economic growth and demand in cheap labor stimulates the mass inflow of migrant workers, from Ukraine included.

There are other factors, mostly national, that impact considerably on the rates of migration for employment.

In the opinion of the Commissioner for Human Rights, poverty and unemployment affect the migration processes in Ukraine to a large extent.

The overwhelming majority of migrant workers are persons who, as a rule, have a little money to travel abroad and pay for a visa and travel documents as well as for the services of mediators. This is also true for Ukraine. Despite the availability of such financial resources, most of the Ukrainians who go abroad to seek employment lack a stable income to ensure a decent subsistence minimum for themselves and their families.

What forces Ukrainians to go abroad is the prospect of being doomed to beggary and poverty in their homeland.

A sociological survey carried out by the West Ukrainian Center Women’s Prospects (Lviv) among Ukrainian migrant workers in Italy showed that the reasons why they went abroad were low wages (52.8%), unemployment (31.7%), and the need to repay loans (29.7%).

In January 2001, during a visit to a prison for deportees in Greece, the Commissioner met with Ukrainian citizens who had worked illegally in that country and were detained for this offense. During a frank conversation with the Commissioner, one of them said: “If I had the opportunity to receive 200 hryvnias a month in Ukraine, I would’ve never gone to Greece.”

Such observations are repeated worldwide by hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian migrant workers who for lack of permanent jobs and regular wages – even holdback pay of many years that had to be cleared off by court decisions – are forced to leave their homeland to seek a better lot elsewhere.

In the First Annual Report in 2000, the Commissioner for Human Rights drew attention of all branches of power to the issues of poverty in Ukraine.

Since then some measures were taken to alleviate the situation. A Strategy of Poverty Reduction was approved by Presidential Edict No.637 of August 15, 2001. In pursuance of the Edict, a Comprehensive Program of Ensuring the Implementation of the Strategy of Poverty Reduction was elaborated and approved by Cabinet of Ministers Resolution No.1712 of December 21, 2001 on the basis of macroeconomic stabilization, economic growth, and more extensively effected social-oriented reforms. Poverty reduction was among the policy priorities of Prime Minister Victor Yanukovych who was appointed to office in November 2002.

In its exercise of parliamentary control over the implementation of the said Strategy, the Ukrainian Parliament held its session devoted to Government Day on September 10, 2002. After discussing the principal agenda “On the Status of Implementation of the Strategy of Poverty Reduction in Ukraine,” the Parliament adopted a resolution on September 26, 2002, stating, in particular, that since the situation in poverty reduction in Ukraine remains unsatisfactory, the work of the Cabinet of Ministers in effecting the measures for implementing the Strategy of Poverty Reduction has been recognized as insufficient.

Despite the expectations encouraged by economic growth, the poverty rate in the country has been dangerously high throughout the past few years. Judging from official government data, the average poverty rate in 2001 was 27.2%. In Transcarpathian oblast the poverty rate that year was 46.6%, while in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea it was 38.4%, in Khmelnytsky oblast 36.8%, in Kherson oblast 36.0%, in Mykolaiv oblast 35.6%, in Volyn oblast 35.5%, and in Luhansk oblast 33.1%.

This means that on the average every fourth Ukrainian does not have enough resources to meet the minimal requirements for his physiological survival.

Apart from the mentioned scope of poverty, high unemployment rates also affect the migration processes. According to ILO figures, Ukraine’s unemployment rate at March 2002 was 10.6% of the economically active population from 15 to 70 years of age, i.e. 2.4 million Ukrainian citizens (Fig. 1.1). Judging from the latest data of the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy, 3 million people are unemployed.

Fig. 1.1. Number of unemployed in 1999–2001 and March 2002*

* Source: State Statistics Committee of Ukraine

Unemployment in the country is of a persistent nature. A study conducted by the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy and the State Statistics Committee showed that the average duration of job-hunting in 1999 was nine months, while the duration of unemployment 18 months. Besides, the rate of forced part-time employment is high. Such a phenomenon as family unemployment is also widespread, especially in multifunctional cities.

The situation is aggravated by the problem of arrears of wages, which has not been dealt with to the present day. It is especially true for the public sector and is a grievous burden that causes suffering for many families.

In their totality, all these factors cause the large outflow of migrant workers who leave Ukraine to find a job in the developed countries of the West.

In the opinion of the Commissioner for Human Rights, Ukraine’s economic performance, regardless of some good headway made in 2000-2002, will for a long time lag behind not only the developed countries of Western Europe, but also its nearest neighbors – Russia, Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Therefore, employment outside the country will remain a vital factor of Ukraine’s economic life. But with the growth of the population whose earnings will exceed the minimum subsistence level and with the reduction of poverty and unemployment ever more Ukrainian citizens will choose their country as the main place of employment.

Whenever a migrant worker decides to go abroad, he takes into consideration not only the opportunity to earn some money, but also the negative consequences: separation from his family, risk of professional level reduction, lack of stability in social status, discomfort in a different cultural environment, discrimination, and the like.

Such a conclusion is also confirmed by international experience. Throughout the 1960s, when Western Europe tended to reduce the gap in economic growth between the poorest countries (Portugal, Spain and Italy) and their richest neighbors (France and Germany), the above-mentioned trend considerably reduced the number of migrant workers: in the period from 1966 to the 1970s, about 250,000 citizens of Italy left the country, while in 1976-1980 Italy had a favorable migration balance.

Another example is Romania. In the mid-1990s when Romania was suffering from an economic crisis, about 50% of graduates of higher technical educational establishments left the country; today the rate is a mere 10%. This came as a result of more new jobs following economic growth and higher wages of skilled labor.

In the opinion of the Commissioner for Human Right, the priority objective of dealing with the negative consequences of migration for employment should be the pursuance of a weighted economic policy oriented primarily toward reducing poverty and unemployment, increasing the share of wages in the population’s real incomes, ensuring stable economic growth, and gradually approximating the incomes of Ukrainian citizens at first to the level of the neighboring countries (Russia, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary) and, eventually, to the level of Greece, Portugal and Italy whose economies are currently absorbing a substantial number of Ukrainian migrant workers.

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