Governments from Central America and the Caribbean strengthen their capacity building and coordination for better management of labour migration in the region

PANAMA CITY, 23 August 2023. Member countries of the Regional Conference on Migration (RCM) participated this month in the "Workshop on labour market information systems and labour migration statistics" in Panama City. This event was followed by the "Workshop on the Construction of the Operational Plan of the Regional Action Plan on Labour Mobility" as a preparation for the implementation of the Regional Action Plan on Labour Mobility 2023 - 2027. Both activities are key advances in the search for the management and promotion of an orderly, safe and beneficial migration in the region, with the support of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

First, important information gaps have been identified for the design of public policies on migration, employment, and the contributions of migrant labour to the economic and social development of the region. In this context, the first workshop focused on strengthening the capacities of representatives of the Ministries of Labour and National Statistical Institutes, and representatives of the Regional Network of Civil Organizations for Migration (RNCOM) in the Labour Market Information Systems, to promote empirical and evidence-based public decision-making and the design and implementation of employment and migration policies.

Layda Mojica, deputy director of employment of the Panama's Ministry of Labour and Workforce Development and participant in the workshop emphasized that "...it is necessary to correlate public employment policies with the needs of the labour market in each country, and this requires a system that allows the generation of reliable data. This articulation strengthens migration governance in each of the destination countries (…).".

As a follow-up and in a complementary manner, the Member Countries seek to coordinate the implementation of the Regional Action Plan on Labour Mobility 2023 - 2027. This is a regional instrument that reflects the commitment to coordinate efforts around labour migration in the region. In this regard, the "Workshop on the Construction of the Operational Plan of the Regional Action Plan on Labour Mobility" focused on building activities for each action line of the Operational Plan.  Government representatives from the Ministries of Labour, Migration and Alien Affairs, and Ministries of Foreign Affairs attended this regional workshop.

In coordination with the Executive Secretariat of the RCM, the Labour Migration Working Group and the ILO, the Operational Plan will be validated by the Member Countries to implement the prioritized actions jointly.

Both activities are inscribed within the framework of close collaboration with the Pro-Tempore Presidency of the Regional Conference on Migration (RCM), exercised by the Government of Panama, and in response to the Objective 1 of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM), which consists of collecting and using accurate and disaggregated data to formulate evidence-based policies.

This work was carried out with the support of the International Labour Organization, and within the framework of the IOM's Western Hemisphere Program (WHP), with funding from the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM) of the U.S. Department of State. 

For more information, please contact Natalia Alvarez, Coordinator of the Labour Migration Unit of the Western Hemisphere Program (nalvarez@iom.int) or Juan Ignacio Castillo, ILO Project Coordinator (castilloj@ilo.org).