More than 10 million Pinoys working and living abroad

published by asingh on Tue, 01/15/2013 - 16:32

Filipinos working or residing abroad reached 10.46 million in 2011 or 5% of total international immigrants, a report showed.

“The International Organization for Migration’s report on ‘Health in the Post-2015 Development Agenda’ cited that there are approximately 215 million international migrants as of 2011,” the 2012 Stock Estimate of Filipinos Overseas report showed.

“About 5% of this number or 10.46 million are overseas Filipinos in about 217 countries and territories,” it further read.

The 2011 Stock Estimate of Filipino Overseas reported that there were 9.45 million Filipinos overseas as of December 2010.

The report showed 4.86 million are permanent migrants, 4.51 million temporary migrants and 1.07 million irregular migrants.

“Irregular migrants could be found mainly in the United States, Malaysia and Singapore,” the report said.

It listed the US as the top destination with 3.43 million Filipinos, followed by Saudi Arabia (1.55 million), Canada (842,651), United Arab Emirates (679,819) and Malaysia (569,081).

The report defines permanent migrants as “immigrants, dual citizens or legal permanent residents abroad, whose stay do not depend on work contracts.”

Temporary migrants are defined as “those whose stay overseas is employment-related and who are expected to return to the Philippines at the end of their work contracts.”

“Irregular are those not properly documented without valid residence or work permits, or who are overstaying in a foreign country.”