15. Migration in Bangladesh: Contexts, Causes and Consequences
Synopsis
Migration, specifically human migration refers to the movement of people from one place to another with the intention of settling permanently or temporarily, at a new location, or geographic region. According to the World Migration Report 2020, human migration may occur from country to country. Sometimes it happens within the country. Internal Organisation for Migration (IOM) shows that in 2019, approximately 272 million people migrated across the borders and 740 million people migrated within the borders. Hence, it is evident that a vast number of people migrate due to various reasons. This trend of migration increased due to disaster, conflict, violence and recently COVID-19 pandemic over the world.
Migration is not a new concept rather it has been a common strategy for adaptation to difficulties in previous places of living. Migration has been taking place since the ancient period of human civilisation. Early human migration happened for agriculture and expanding populations. Later, colonisation also resulted in migration. In the modern period, human migration has primarily taken the form of migration within and between existing sovereign states (National Geographic, 2023). Migration in Asia became popular in the 20th century. In 2019, over 40 percent of the world’s international migrants were from Asia. Internal migration has also increased since the 90s (IOM, 2020).