ODI – Development is migration: millions leave their countries each year in search of opportunities and better lives. People also leave their homes to escape conflict, repression or environmental disasters. Remittances – the money that people send home from abroad – accounts for nearly 600 billion dollars, dwarfing global aid budgets.

Our research and high-level debates on the crisis in the Mediterranean and, more recently, on the Syrian refugee crisis, examine how we can meet these global challenges – and the role of international development to better manage global migration.

Through research, events, media engagement and partnerships, ODI offers evidence to lay bare the political and economic realities of migration and to inform the public debate.

Specifically, we focus on three areas: refugees and displacement, European migration policy and human mobility.