Prospects for future outward migration flows: China and Southeast Asia

The gross outflow of migrants from China and Southeast Asia has been increasing steadily in the past few decades and has reached more than 2 million per year in recent years. Whereas in China most of the rapid growth in population mobility has been confined within its territory, out migration flows from Southeast Asian countries, notably Indonesia and the Philippines, have become significant. The region itself absorbed most of the migration which has been driven by widening income differentials, demographic factors, and in some instances by the violence of internal strife. This paper identifies the demographic, economic, political and environmental factors in China, Indonesia and the Philippines which are likely to shape out migration from the three countries over the next two decades.