Presented by IWMI's Alan Nicol at the 2016 Stockholm World Water Week, in Stockholm, Sweden, on August 29, 2016. At the session on "Migration and water management: Lessons for policy and practice".

1. Policy questions on migration, rural
transformation and water resources
management in Sub-Saharan Africa
Dr Alan Nicol, IWMI

2. Scale
• Demographic shifts
• Employment
challenges
• Cash economies
– migration options
• Water scarcity /
climate change are
not the core drivers
• Key Issues
– Rural-urban outmigration
– Uganda – half the population
15 or younger
– Youth migration
– Implications for the
demographic transition
• where people work
• how they manage resources
• What they choose to invest in

3. Implications
• Remittances: 2013
(official inflows) $33.2
billion / ODA $46.8 (World
Bank 2016, Migration and Remittances)
• Substantial inflows
– E.g. Liberia 24.6%
(GDP); lower
proportion, larger
absolutes
• Nigeria ($21bn)
• Ghana ($2bn)
• Kenya ($1.6bn)
• Uganda ($0.9bn)
– Unofficial far
higher
• Key Issues
– Gender-disaggregation of data
– Origins of migrants / feedback loops
• 75% of poor and food insecure live in rural
areas
• Where are remittances going / what are
they used for?
– Youth as drivers of change
• Land ownership, catchment management
• Policy agendas on water-smart agriculture,
climate-smart agriculture, sustainable
intensification
• Rural-urban linkages

4. (some) key follow-up questions
• What is understood/misunderstood about
migration and land-water-energy
developments?
• What could a typology of migration tell us?
• What are the goals and policy implications of
‘doing more’ for migrants (and communities)?
• What might an integrated migration and
development policy look like in practice?
(economic, social protection, financial policy,
resource governance, legal instruments, etc…)