Kathmandu – IOM, the UN Migration Agency, and the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) have renewed an agreement to collaborate in the areas of labour migration, remittances and climate change, and expanded their collaboration to include disaster risk reduction in the Hindu Kush Himalaya region.

The six-year Memorandum of Understanding signed today (3/11) in Kathmandu by IOM Nepal Chief of Mission Paul Norton and ICIMOD Director General David Molden follows an earlier agreement signed in November 2014. 

It ensures that IOM and ICIMOD will continue to work together through capacity building and awareness-raising to share information and develop migration management tools.

The agreement highlights the importance of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the efforts that the two organizations will make to complement and promote the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, while forging a closer partnership in areas of shared interest.

 “One billion people are on the move today, which is more than at any other time in recorded history. Forces driving such large scale of migration include climate change, natural and man-made catastrophes, conflict, demographic trends of an ageing industrialized population, jobless youth population in the developing world and widening economic disparities,” said IOM Nepal Chief of Mission Paul Norton.

 “IOM is committed to addressing the links between migration, environment and climate change on all fronts – research, policy and operational – and, at all levels – global, regional and national,” he said, noting that IOM is a member of the Taskforce on Displacement under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and is implementing the Sendai Framework and the SDGs, as well as playing a leading role in the development of the Global Compact on Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration.

“IOM will continue to work towards mainstreaming human mobility, disaster risk reduction and climate change in diverse areas, building collaboration and breaking down silos,” he added.

ICIMOD Director General Dr. David Molden said, “Policymakers in Hindu Kush Himalayan countries should seek ways to mainstream human mobility into national processes associated with the SDGs, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and the UNFCCC. ICIMOD will continue to work closely with its regional member countries to facilitate exchange of good practices to govern mobility and help countries to harness opportunities arising out of human mobility.”

There are nearly 250 million international migrants, and some 750 million domestic migrants. In other words, there are a billion migrants among the world’s seven billion people. One in every seven people on the globe is a migrant. In Nepal, over half of all households now have at least one migrant family member currently abroad or living in Nepal as a returnee. Nepal ranks 23rd among the world’s remittance-receiving countries; in terms of the contribution of remittances to GDP, it ranks third after Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz Republic.

For more information, please contact Paul I. Norton at IOM Nepal, Tel: +97714426250, Email: iomnepal@iom.int. Or Sudina Shakya, ICIMOD, Tel: +97715003222, Email: Sudina.Shakya@icimod.org