What are the immigration trends to EU for EU and Non-EU citizens?

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Introduction

International migration plays an increasing role in most Member States. Immigration brings both economic and social opportunities and challenges to countries receiving immigrants. At the same time, immigration is now at the forefront of European and national policy agendas.

Increase in immigration has slowed

Total immigration in the EU increased over the last five years. In 2006 the number of immigrants was nearly a quarter higher than in 2002. The annual average increase was more than 100 000 during this period. However, in the last three years this increase has slowed, even turning into a decline in 2005. The biggest rise in immigration was in Ireland and Spain: in Ireland immigration doubled in 2006 compared with 2002 while Spain received three quarters more immigrants in 2006 than in 2002. In absolute numbers, Spain had the biggest increase— 350 000 immigrants more in 2006 than five years earlier. By contrast, several countries including Germany, Austria and the Netherlands saw a decline in immigration over the whole or part of the period. In 2006, total immigration to these three countries was 14%, 17% and 11% respectively lower than in 2002.

Spain, Germany and UK received more than half of all immigrants

The largest numbers of immigrants to the EU in 2006 were recorded in Spain, Germany and United Kingdom. These three countries together received more than 2 million immigrants (including returning nationals). The total number of immigrants recorded in the national registers reached over 840 000 in Spain and over 660 000 in Germany1. In the United Kingdom, the number of immigrants identified at the border as intending to stay at least one year was nearly 530 000, according to national statistics. However, among these countries only Spain also had high immigration relative to its population size. The highest rate of immigration was recorded in Luxembourg, followed by Ireland, Cyprus and Spain. These four countries had significantly higher rates compared with other Member States, while for Germany and the United Kingdom, immigration per 1000 inhabitants was close to the EU-27 average.

Majority of immigrants were non-EU citizens

In 2006, of a total of 3.5 million immigrants to the EU-27 Member States, about 3 million (86%) were foreigners — i.e. they were not citizens of the country to which they migrated. The rest (14%) were nationals returning to their home country. More than half, or in absolute numbers more than 1.8 million immigrants, were not citizens of any EU Member State. However, this does not mean that all non-EU immigrants were newcomers to the EU — the number includes immigrants both from outside the EU and from the other Member States. Slightly less than half of all immigrants, 1.7 million, were EU citizens, of whom nearly half a million were nationals returning to their own country.

Looking only at foreign citizens, 60% of immigrants were citizens of countries outside the European Union (non-EU immigrants), while 40% were citizens of other EU Member States. Non-EU citizens were made up fairly equally of citizens of European non-EU countries, Asian, American and African countries, ranging from 13% to 16%, with a few per cent from Oceania or without known citizenship.

Immigrants to Member States were of varied origin

Citizens of all countries of the world were represented among immigrants to the EU Member States. However, the citizenship composition of immigrants to different Member States varied greatly. In 2006, most Member States counted more non-EU than EU citizens among foreign immigrants. The exceptions were Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Hungary, Austria and Slovakia and Belgium (in 2003), where more EU than non-EU immigrants were recorded. Returning nationals accounted for a minority of immigrants in most countries. However, Denmark, Lithuania and Finland recorded more nationals than non-national EU or non-EU immigrants. The available data for all countries that received immigrants indicates that, among non-national immigrants, Polish citizens formed the largest group in the EU-27 in 2006. The estimated number of Polish immigrants to other Member States was more than 290 000. The second largest group was Romanians, with more than 230 000. Among non-national EU citizens migrating to other Member States, British and Germans were next in number though somewhat less numerous — the British at nearly 100 000 and Germans at 90 000. The substantial numbers of British, German, and also French and Italian citizens (around 50 000 each) migrating to other Member States is explained by the population size of these countries. In relative terms, per 1000 nationals living in their home country of citizenship, these nationalities had significantly lower migration compared to migrating non-national EU citizens in the EU-27 on average. By contrast, Romanian and Polish citizens were numerous in both absolute numbers and relative terms, as were Bulgarian and Slovak citizens.

Among non-EU immigrants, the figures for Moroccan citizens were much higher than those for any other non-EU nationality in absolute terms, at some 140 000 in 2006, according to estimates. Thus, Moroccans were the third largest group of non-national immigrants in the EU-27 as a whole after Poles and Romanians. Ukrainians and Chinese were the next most numerous among non-EU immigrants. Their numbers were close to the numbers of Britons and Germans migrating to other Member States.

Every Member State has its own citizenship profile for immigrants. Citizens of some countries are attracted by several Member States, while others have only one main country of destination More than half of all migrating Polish citizens settled in Germany, while a large part of the rest went to the United Kingdom. For Romanians, the most attractive destination countries were Spain and Italy (the latter according to 2003 data). Nearly half of British citizen migrants went to Spain, while German, Italian and French citizens had less preference for one particular country of destination, settling more often in neighbouring countries or in other large countries in the EU-27. Among non-EU immigrants, Moroccans ranked first in flows to Spain and Belgium (the latter according to 2003 data) but were also numerous in France and Italy. Of nearly 100 000 Ukrainians migrating to the EU, three quarters migrated to the Czech Republic and Italy; other attractive destinations for Ukrainians were Spain and Portugal. Chinese citizens most often migrated to Spain and to the United Kingdom but also to several other countries. Albanians migrated to neighbouring countries — Greece and Italy. US citizens had the United Kingdom and Germany as their favourite destinations but migrated to many other Member States as well. Turkish and Russian citizens were frequent immigrants to several Member States, too. Many Turks migrated to Germany and Austria but France and the Netherlands were also popular. Russians were the largest group of immigrants to Finland and Latvia. Many Russians migrated to Germany. By contrast, some citizens were significant among immigrants to one country, e.g. Indians to the United Kingdom, Bolivians and Brazilians to Spain.

Reference

Herm, A. (2008), “Recent migration trends: citizens of EU-27 Member States become ever more mobile while EU remains attractive to non-EU citizens”. Eurostats – Statistics in Focus 98/2008.